This Christmas time Big Brother has launched some doozies at us regarding the big guy in the red suit. He absolutely loves Christmas and certainly believes in the all the magic surrounding it. However, he is 5 and is trying to make sense of Santa.
How exactly do you make sense of the big guy in the red suit who shimmies on down the chimney of every little girl and boy’s house on Christmas Eve?
Well, here’s just a snippet of what Big Brother wants to know and observations he has made.
I wonder how Santa gets down the chimney without getting spiders and black widows on him.
Me: I’m either silent or reach into the red sack of lies and throw out “Santa must be magic”.
Why does Santa have to live in the North Pole? Why can’t he just live in the city?
Me: Lets see what else I can pull from this sack of lies: “Ummm…because his toy shop is sooo big, it’s the only place it will fit”. (I know…what??)
It must have taken Santa a long time to grow that beard. I guess when he was a little boy, no one got presents for awhile.
I’ve got nothing.
Big Brother was just about to see Santa at the mall and I asked him if he knew what he was going to say, this was his response:
Yes, I do but I’m not gonna tell ya.
Alrighty then, let me know how that works out for you.
Even with all his questions and keen observations, the magic of Christmas still shines bright in his eyes. He revealed that one of the items on his wish list was “a robot that can pick up twigs with its arms”.
Dad pipes in and asks “have you ever seen one of those?”
No, but Santa can make one in his workshop and all the elves can help.
I’ll stay silent on this one too Big Brother. Unfortunately, I cannot pull out a robot that can pick up twigs from this big red sack of lies.
Still, I’m not ready for the jig to be up quite yet.
I love Christmas morning. Big Brother and Little Sister can barely contain themselves as they squeal with excitement, begging us to get out of bed and come downstairs to see what Santa has bestowed upon them.
I’ll just have to make sure that Big Brother has a few items on his wish list that Santa can pick up at Target or Toys R Us. After all, the magic years are so fleeting. I want to believe in all of it just as much as Big Brother does.
How do you handle the Santa inquisitions? If Santa has been found out, what age were your children when they made the discovery?
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My daughter is almost seven and never once questioned Santa. Sure we don't talk about it much, but still .. I don't think she cares how the presents get there, as long as they do!
LOL! I love that he's keeping what he told Santa secret from you! I'm guessing he's totally onto Santa–or at least sussing it out! LOL
Oh these are great. You've got yourself a little thinker there. So far the kids being so young are just starting to catch on that there is a Santa. They're more interested in making sure they get their daily piece of chocolate from the advent calendar. I'm not looking forward to the sad realization the kids will have down the road. The word of the season for me now is "savor." Savor every last moment of this magic.
This is a lie, or series of lies, that I fully intend to last as long as I can make it. I still remember the year I found out the truth. I was so sad and I forced myself to "believe" one last year but then it was over. I mean the spirit of Christmas is still here and always will be but it's never quite is fantastical and magical as when you are an innocent child.
Melissa, this is so funny! Man, he sure has been firing the questions your way. I did the same thing, pulling my little white lies out of that big, red bag. Eventually I can't even remember how the oldest one figured it out, but he went along for years.
Now? They both "get it", but we still play along for fun.
Except we are realizing that means more stuff to buy. So maybe this will be the last year.
Good luck with the questions!
Interesting how he's posing questions and considering how logical the tale of Santa actually is. I know we are good for this year, but I kind think we might start getting questions in another year, once she's in school full time.
We've had a few this year but have been able to dodge them. I remember whei stopped believing and i want to keep it up for as long as possible.
I am such a lazy question answerer – "Santa is magic!" is my answer to everything.
He was skeptical of how every mall, store, etc. has a Santa, so we told him those were specially-designated Santa helpers, picked by the big man himself.
We also told him that sometimes, for reasons we can't really understand, Santa doesn't bring EXACTLY what you ask for, but he always brings what he thinks is best. (For those twig-picking-robot moments!)
I know next year when he's 5 1/2, the questions will be harder and I don't know what we'll do. I love the magic of Santa, and although I know it will end someday, I'm milking it while I can!
ha! I will be saving some of these lies for next year, Maggie isn't *quite* there yet, but I see the gears in her head a-churning…. so funny!
my hubs and i got sick of santa getting all the credit….we shifted gears last year after i spent hours scouring craigslist for the perfect loft bed, we drove over an hour to pick it up, and then my hubs spent days sanding and repainting the bed. we were NOT letting that santa dude steal our thunder! so now, we lay claim to all the good presents and then we wrap a few special ones from santa and their stockings are filled by santa. that way they still get a bit of the Christmas magic but the stress of hiding and lying is taken off a bit. also, i'm a really bad liar and keep slipping up throughout the year when talking about past Christmas gifts that santa supposedly brought!
We don't do Santa at our house. Plain and simple. I know, I know. I've dealt with the criticism for taking the magic out of Christmas and ruining my children's childhood. But, even without Santa, my kids are still bundles of excitement and squeals on Christmas morning.
I'll tell you, I hate having to keep up the charade of Santa. I know it's kind of nice and special, but I think the holiday would be just as special if kids knew they were getting presents from parents rather than an old man with a beard. When I was a kid, we didn't have a chimney, so my mom told me he came through the door. I imagined how he did that when we locked it every night. I also wondered why his writing was the same as my mom's. I'll tell ya'–I have enough imagination to have fun reading about magical beings–I don't want them in my house. Even when it's only pretend.
This is a great question. My son still thinks Santa is real but then again he's only 4 but he does asked about Santa's skin color when he met a local Santa here last year oh and that question came after some tears because the local Santa scares him LOL. You handled the questions so perfectly, I have to keep those in minds
Love it! I will have to remember some of your answers for when my daughter is old enough to ask. Your son is very clever
Let me know how that robot works out for you!
My son is 4.5 so this is his first Christmas that he's really cognizant of what's going on. He seems to believe in Santa – today he told me he wanted to leave out yogurt for Santa instead of cookies. We have been in the camp of not REALLY playing it up a lot, but not denying it either. I think we'll just play it by ear.
I agree with Missy… I use "Santa is magic!" for just about everything Santa. My daughter is 9-years-old and she still believes in Santa! We've used the "Santa-cam" and a couple of other ideas from the movie The Polar Express. The elves watch the kids all over the world on their TV monitors at the North Pole. So we've taken advantage of that idea and have told our kids that we have our very own "Santa-Cam", too! (Not really… it's just the house alarm sensor that's mounted on the wall near the back door!) And it completely works! This year, I caught the kids standing on chairs to hold up their wish lists for Santa to read on the "Santa-Cam". It was priceless! The magic of Santa is awesome, even for us adults… keep it for as long as you can!
Julia fully believes in magic. Any question can be answered by the fact that he's magic. Plus I've eluded many times that there are things in this world none of us will ever understand. I use this strategy when she asks tough questions about religion.
Lies about Santa are just a few of the many lies I tell my daughter constantly. I feel like I am a professional liar – no seriously, I do! But I will continue to lie to her to keep her a kid as long as I can.
I love the name of this post, by the way!
I am so glad we haven't started with all this yet. I am not sure my little lie detector will go for my answers.
I'm with Katherine. We've decide to leave Santa out of our holiday. And I've discovered something amazing…besides stealing our thunder by giving the best presents, he wasn't much of our holiday anyway. The true miracle of Christ is more than enough to keep our holiday magical and knowing that their gifts came from us, out of our love for them, builds our family bonds in ways that lying about Santa Claus never could. Taking Santa and 'wish lists' of gifts out of our holiday has made it easier to focus on the real meaning of Christmas and fight off the commercialization.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I think I'm going to blog about our decision as well…
once they start school the other kids ruin it for you.
My kids all found out the truth by K from other little kids. Which, I think is terrible. I think if parents want to tell their kids the truth then they also need to tell them to keep it a secret to other kids out of politeness.
We have all the same issues. Strangely, my kids watched one of those "Santa" movies (with Tim Allen, I think) and it clarified a lot in their heads. It simply provided answers about how a new Santa takes over and how he magically gets skinny when he goes down a chimney.
My explanations are met with skeptical glances. The movie, though, well that's the gospel!
We've never believed in Santa, b/c in South America, it's the Baby Jesus who brings the toys.
Now, this is a problem when your little boy goes across the street and tells the 2 little boys there that Santa isn't real.
Cue the 2 angry moms marching over to my house.
Yes. good times in the suburbs.
That's why I had to turn to the internet to make friends….(-:
I always told the boys that Santa was a game and now they were in on the fun. But I'm like you — I want to keep it alive as long as possible! I'm a sucker for magic and wonder…
Oh my gosh, you made me laugh so hard!!! A robot that picks up twigs! That is definitely something for the books…even to mention during his wedding rehearsal dinner…You've gotta love the Santa questions!
The red sack of lies – that's hilarious! And true!