Considering Santa

Benjamin informed me the other day that kids who believe in Santa are lucky because they get lots of stuff.  I'm not sure what kind of stuff he was referring to.  It seems to me that he has gotten more "stuff" than he knows what to do with.  I guess he means "magical" stuff.

I'm not sure when we decided that our kids weren't going to believe in Santa.  We just never really brought it up.  We also tell them that daddy is the tooth fairy.  Pretty unimaginative, huh.


It's actually surprising to me that after raising seven other kids who never even cared about the whole Santa thing, we suddenly have an issue.  Ben just keeps saying that he knows that Santa isn't real but he wishes that he was.  So do I.  Sortof.

Except that it's kindof creepy to me to think about this strange old man who never dies, sneaking into my house every year while I am sleeping.  Not to mention that he would be watching us all year long.
There are some perks, though.  I mean, I sure would look forward to the presents magically appearing in my living room.  All of the hopes and dreams of all the children around the whole world fulfilled in one day.  No shopping.  Gotta love that.

I guess we just decided a long time ago, that if we were going to tell our children that something was real, it ought to be real.  And if we tell them that it is make-believe, they believe us.  Every time I try to kid with Ben and tell him,  "OK, Santa IS real."  He says, "Don't joke with me Mommy!  I need you to tell me the truth!"  He wants to know that he can trust us.  I'm not gonna tell him what he wants to hear, I'm gonna tell him the TRUTH.  That way, when something truly important comes up, our kids can trust us to shoot straight.

We're not really religious about the whole thing, though.  I'll use Santa wrapping paper, if it's on sale.  We just don't make a big deal out of it.  We want our Christmas celebration to be a little more Christ-ish than Santa-ish.  We recognize that the presents are from the Lord, not Santa.  Not that they magically appeared in our house because Jesus brought them, or anything weird like that.  Just that He gave us the means to make the money to buy the presents.  Thank the Lord.  Amen.

Yep, chocolate chip cheesecake.  Only the best for the Lord!  ; )

On Christmas morning we usually have a birthday cake, candles and all... It's the best birthday celebration of the whole year.  One time a breeze blew through the kitchen out of nowhere, and the kids are still convinced that the Lord blew out His own candles.  Now that's something to believe in!