Are you as excited as I am for Christmas??? I am so ready for family time, good food, and of course...presents!! Since Phebe and I already exchanged gifts (more on that later), my full focus is on the boys opening presents....but who will they be from?
After Rocky was born, we decided we were going to tell him the truth about Santa Claus from the get go...we weren't going to indulge the fantasy. His 1st Christmas he was 9 months old so it wasn't a big deal. Last year he was a year and a half. The most he understood was to open presents. This year is a little different...
Rocky is two and a half and very much aware of the Christmas season. It has been a blast getting ready for Christmas. The tree is up, presents are wrapped under it, and it hasn't been knocked down! We've watched "Rudolph" (daily) and "A Charlie Brown Christmas" (semi-weekly) due to Phebe and his love for old, animated Christmas movies. One problem - Santa keeps popping up everywhere! He's in the movies, he's at the mall, and people ask Rocky if Santa's bringing him presents...so I thought I would ask Rocky this question:
"Hey Rock."
"What?"
"What does Santa do?"
"Ho, ho, ho"
"Yes, you're right. What else?"
"I don't know."
"Does he give presents to little girls and boys?"
"No....."
"Who is going to give you presents?"
"Daddy!"
"Will Santa give you any?"
"No...I don't know"
After this conversation, I asked Rocky if Santa gave presents to boys and girls who don't have a mommy or a daddy.....he said "I don't know"..... then "Yeah".
So one night, Phebe and I talked. He believed in Santa when he was little as did I. We both loved it and have nothing but wonderful memories............why did we say we didn't want Rocky to believe? Well, we've squashed that idea.
We've told Rocky the true meaning of Christmas. When I told him we celebrate Jesus' birthday, he asked if he got a cake! So, our new tradition is making Jesus a birthday cake! As long as the true meaning is there...I don't think it will hurt to also have the fairy tale...
2 comments:
I liked this post because it is a bit of a dilemma. I'll tell you what we did. We liked believing in Santa as kids and weren't tramatized when the truth came out so we tried, but our daughter never bought it. She figured it out right away, our son believed for a while, but before we opened gifts, we always read the Christmas story in Luke that shares the true meaning of Christmas and as the kids got older, they took turns reading it. They are now 23 and almost 20 and we will read it aloud before the presents are opened again this year. Savannah will get to experience the tradition and the real meaning of Christmas. They are nice memories.
Merry Christmas to you, Phebes, Rocky, and Simie.
Love
Tina and Ted
Tina-
You're awesome! What a great idea to read the story...that just kinda brings it home! We talk about it, but reading it aloud out of the Bible sounds like wonderful family time! We'll start that this year!
Love you guys! Merry Christmas!
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