Hi Ho!

That's not meant to sound rude. Just festive.

Ah, Christmas. It's different when you have kids. I remember being a kid and being desperate to see the presents on Christmas morning. I remember being sent back to bed on more than one occasion because, well, the sun wasn't up. In fact, I don't think it had finished going down. I can appreciate the excitement that Princess was feeling. DW and I do have an extra weapon to manage over-excited children that my parents didn't have. Santa!

Yep. We wield the jolly fat guy like a red and white, present giving sabre. Oh, we don't play the "Santa only gives presents to good children" card because Princess knows just as well as we do that she doesn't behave and she still gets presents. She always has and she always will. However, she is a pretty smart kid and aside from the falling for the whole Santa caper in the first place, she has a bit of reasoning about her that we duly exploit. For example, Santa won't visit if he knows you are awake. And he knows, so you can't fool him.

Funnily enough, Princess doesn't really trust Santa. Looking through her Christmas photos from Kinder, all the other kids are laughing and hugging Santa but Princess always stands away from him and doesn't even like passing him in the shopping mall. DW and I can't figure out why she doesn't like him as she hasn't had any "Bad Santa" experiences, though it is possible that she might have unwittingly seen an episode of Futurama that had an angry, judgemental Santa with an Uzi. She is also not so keen on the Easter Bunny, though I think more kids would be afraid if they knew the Easter bunny is really a Pooka (see a film called Harvey if you don't believe me).

I never believed in Santa growing up. I knew who Santa was supposed to be, but we were never told that he was real, only that he was a fictional character that supposedly took credit for the presents parents gave. Why parents would want there children to think their presents came from a strange obese man that broke into houses for a living, I'm not sure. My sister once told me that she and her husband had been particularly proud of the lavish presents they had bestowed on their children one year. When they smugly asked the kids if they were happy with the haul, the eldest replied in hurt tones that the presents were wonderful but no thanks to them, because they had forgotten to get the kids anything. Santa had done all the work.

DW and I discussed the merits of telling Princess and Little Man the truth about Santa but she was adamant that it would ruin Christmas for Princess if she knew. I'm not so sure. My own memories of Christmas were of presents and sugar hits galore, and family and holidays and fun and more sugar. I never experienced the disappointment of discovering Santa wasn't real. But DW does have a point. The Santa myth is something Princess still shares with her friends and that is part of her Christmas experience. Anyway, now she is at school, I'd be surprised if that bubble doesn't burst soon enough. Little Man doesn't really care as long as he gets presents and lots of sugar. Bring on Easter.

Ciao!

Thought for the (Christmas) Day: Pissled Tink