So our kids are finally old enough to really get into the whole Santa Claus thing this year. Last week, Scott had a discussion over at his blog that I want to continue here. What do you tell your kids about Santa? They’ve already started asking me how he’s going to get in the house. That has to sound weird to a little kid. “Listen, this big old guy is going to come down the chimney and sneak around the house on Christmas Eve, OK?”
When they ask if he’s real, what do you say? If you go along with the whole thing, isn’t that lying to your kids? I want them to enjoy the season, but I don’t want to lie to them. Am I being too silly here?
I guess I feel like their innocence will be gone soon enough, so we’ll probably play along. Anybody got any advice? Were you totally traumatized when you found out “the truth” about Santa?
already & not yet 
I don’t know that this is from a wealth of wisdom but I can tell you what my parents did. While we were very young (I don’t know 2 or 3) they just let us believe in Santa, with little or no input. As we started asking questions they approached it as a game. They told us that THIS PART of Christmas was a pretending game and they told us how it worked. With the imagination of a 5 year old, we might as well believed, and my parents weren’t caught having to explain why they “lied” to us when we were older. The result was three boys who grew up not thinking “If they lied to us about Santa what about God” (I know a little extreme but possible) and I dare say that you will not find three guys more excited about Christmas than my brothers and I, even to this day.
Just show them Tim Allen’s The Santa Clause. None of those crappy sequels. Just the classic original.
I think where I end up on the discussion is very similar to what James said above. As long as they want to believe, fine. But we treat is as nothing more than legend and make believe. Just as they might believe that Dora is real so we let them believe that Santa is real.But when they ask point blank if it’s true our response will be the truth. “No, honey. Responsible parents would never let their daughter scale a volcano with just a monkey and an interactive backpack.”
Jason,Check out the children’s book “So Many Gifts.” Not sure where you can find it but an internet search would likely be fruitful. Maybe check Dora’s backpack? Maybe Santa will bring you a copy?Anyhow . . . it is the best book I have EVER seen to talk about how to keep the “spirit” of Santa alive in a way that fosters the spirit but gives a very reasonable explanation. It is really good.What creeps ME out is that MOST of the characters who play Santa in malls are types you would not even let your child NEAR if they were in street clothes (likely leather with exposed ink pictures of motorcycles on their biceps.”)
No wisdom here…but a story, perhaps? When I was..um, younger…maybe 5 or 6, I had come to my own realization that there was no santa. I had started telling my friends, and perhaps my brother. Even when sweet old people would come up to me and ask if I was excited to see santa, I would tell them (proably not sweetly) that I didn’t believe in santa. Well…my parents wanted to encourage me to continue to believe such an innocent childish belief..well, that or show their smarty pants kid a lesson!! One of my dad’s friends had a December gig as a Santa, so they took my brother and me to see him. I was skeptical, and and angry that I even had to go sit on the old man’s lap.Imagine a skeptical kid’s surprise when she sat on the ‘stranger’s’ lap and the first thing he said was, “And what would you like for Christmas, Stacy?”My parents said my eyes were wide open and my jaw dropped!
You mean Santa Claus isn’t real?
Tell them the story of St. Nicholas. We emphasize that the tradition is carried down from year-to-year, generation-to-generation, age-to-age, etc (you know what I mean). Our stories, legends, and traditions are usually based on some sort of ground truth. Believe It or Not: Saint Nicholas
We did not lie to our kids when they started questioning things about Santa. I would always say what do you feel in your heart. As they got older they figured it out but I told them Christmas was always in your heart and that is where the true meaning to us came from. The love of Christmas is the warm feeling I have in my heart when giving to others and I tried to stress that to our girls. They both still love Christmas and I do not think it traumatized them. When Jamie figured out what we were talking about it was fun for her to stay excited for May. May still loves every aspect about Christmas and it did not bother her one bit and still loves the count down calendar. I asked her the other day if we were still going to do it and she said “duh” that is part of Christmas. So you just have to do what you think is best for your family and that will be what is best for you.
lying to your kids is a natural part of being a parent…as well as bribery and blackmail….embrace it 😉
Thanks for all the comments, guys. I like the idea of letting them play along as long as they want to, but telling them the truth if they ask.Skid, I’ll swing by our public library tomorrow and see if they have a copy of So Many Gifts. Thanks for the story, Stacy. I can picture you as a child telling everybody that Santa wasn’t real! So what are you going to tell Lawson?Lane, I hate to break it to you…Ed, I have to admit I know nothing about St. Nicolas. I’ll add that to the list, along with Skid’s recommendation.
As Dana Carvey’s church lady character from SNL used to say, “Rearrange the letters from SANTA and what do you get?….SATAN!”No,I’m just kidding. I liked everyone’s advice about the Santa thing. I officially found out when I was 9, but it didn’t really bother me all that much. Laura, Lucy and I still put out cookies for Mom every year, so we always enjoy that part. So, if they ever ask you directly, and you have to tell them straight out, is there a way you can tell them and have them still play along?
We did what several parents talked about here…we just let them play along and were very vague with our answers to their questions when they were younger. When they seemed to ask for real (for the second time), we had a very nice story about Santa being a fun thing to let (God’s and)your own spirit of giving come through. Our older boys responded with…oh,isn’t that neat. Our youngest said “what, well I’m still going to believe in Santa!” We still “pretend” there’s a Santa in our Christmast conversations.
I thought ths was interesting and wanted to post. It comes from the family which runs TIMBERDOODLE.———————————–Dear Friends,The most controversial email we have ever sent has to be last year’s poke at Santa. Many of our readers wrote to remind us that the myth of Santa is based on the story of St. Nicholas; however, we were not disputing the historicity of St. Nicholas, but rather were appalled at what the story has evolved into. When you allow a corrupted version of St. Nicholas in your celebration, when you embrace another entity with God-like qualities whose favor can be earned by good works, what are the ramifications to an impressionable child?But while it is all too easy to be smug about our Santa-less celebration, we need to be mindful that what we despise in this cookie-eating, belly-shaking, jolly old man exists in the very core of our being. While we shake our heads in wonder that parents would ascribe to another being attributes of God, it may be that we unwittingly fashion ourselves into mini-gods. We not only want others to think well of us, but we also want them to need us, to need our things, to need our wisdom, to need our friendship, and to need our approval. We manipulate others so as to be gods in their lives. And because an important aspect of worship is conforming to the expectations of the one you worship, those others will begin to redesign themselves to be more acceptable to us. That thought should sicken us more than Santa-soaked celebrations. It is frighteningly easy to see where others fall short and despairingly difficult to realize our own sin. This year, as we celebrate the birth of our Savior, let us strive to do so in a manner worthy of Him. ——————————— Ok, here go my commentsWe have never lied to the kids about Santa. When they would ask questions, I’d respond with a question like… Well, what to YOU think about that? I was never comfortable giving Santa GOD like qualities and then have to break the news to the kids that we made up the whole thing.I love the story of Santa though,and one of our traditions is for Richard to read THE NIGHT BEFORE CHRISTMAS to all of us each year on Christmas Eve. We have talked about Santa having a giving spirit in the story and we try to have a giving spirit at Christmas by gift giving and serving others. Our kids were too sharp to buy into the con and have always been excited to wake up on Christmas morning and see what surprises are waiting for them though.
Not sure about the santa thing, but love the quote from donnie. I think a top 10 truths you dont tell your kids could be funny. “No son you’ll never be a great athlete”, “sweety don’t get too attached to barbie, you’ll never look like that”…sorry for the random comment