Santa

What we do is (remember I have an older child, lol) have a small santa stocking which we will up woth small things, like hair ties, bubble bath, facecloth, small cars, candy canes etc, to the value of about $20 and thats what "santa" brings. Mr 5 now wonders about why santas sleigh has bikes and stuff on then and why stories have santa brigning kids big stuff so we told him that we buy the things for santa to bring, and they are gifts form us, but santa looks after them so there is no peeking...seems like alot of effort and porkies but works well for us! (and really adds to the magic thing!)

My friend's parents really did give her only coal one year ...they aren't the most nurturing of parents mind you ....

I think its quite interesting if you do Santa, what he actually brings in the way of gifts - so many variations. In our house growing up we had a stocking / pillow case / sack that had small toys, underwear etc and all the cool stuff was from Mum and Dad and then later at the family event there was no Santa, he was just for Xmas morning with your sack of goodies but the main stuff was from Mum and Dad.

In other families I've since discovered sometimes all the presents, from water pistol to trampoline was from Santa.

DS has a lovely Santa sack, its kinda pillow case sized and we do things like colouring in things / stickers / cars / spinning tops / cheap DVD or CDs / bath toys / sand pit toys and then maybe one nice wrapped present (last year was his baby boy doll). Everything else is from the person gifting. Obviously he was only 18mths last Xmas so didnt have much of a clue but we have a nice hard back book of Xmas stories that we read every day in December so he'll catch on. This year I will find a nice simple Christian book that explains the birth of Jesus that we will read.

I also believe if you are going to celebrate a religious holiday you should know its origins... last year on a UK forum there was a post that seemed sincerely asking about why we celebrate on the 25/12 and 'something about this person called Jesus' could have been a troll but it seemed geniuine

kiwikd, perhaps it was because a lot of the rest of Europe celebrate Christmas on the 24th, not the 25th?

In my house everything was from Santa, DH's was the same so I think that's what we'll do. I don't really care if my kids think I paid for it or a magical person brought it for them as at that age they've not really got any concept of money/cost anyway. We now know how much expense and sacrifice they went to and of course appreciate it.