The Real Santa

(This entry should be updated to include several pictures later today)

My wife’s family has always celebrated Christmas a little differently than my family did. They do all the opening of presents on Christmas Eve. We opened presents last night and I made out pretty well…and Corryn made out even better! She has a great pile of loot that we will have to somehow pack up and take home with us after this fun week in Utah!!!

I think my favorite part of Christmas Eve was when Santa came. Before the kids started opening presents last night they had a visit from the ‘bearded man in red’. The older kids (Corryn two and Taylor almost four) were scared of Santa. He had presents for all of the kids but those two couldn’t be coaxed to go sit on Santa’s lap to receive the gifts. Corryn was clinging to her mom as tight as possible. She wanted nothing to do with Santa.

I have to say that at first I was kind of pleased by this. I’ve never been a big fan of the whole idea of Santa. I’ve never wanted to go to great lengths to convince my kid that the Santa myth is true. When she gets older and finds out that Santa is a lie why wouldn’t she then question some of the other fantastic sounding things we’ve taught her…things like a living prophet who talks to God and the stories about Jesus? I’m probably over-reacting but that is how I’ve felt about the whole thing.

Corryn was clinging tightly to her mom when Lisa whispered into her ear, “Sweetheart, its just grandpa wearing a Santa costume.”

Corryn lifted her head up from Lisa’s shoulder to look at Santa. She listened for a second to his voice then immediately ran to his lap and accepted her present. That moment I thought–this is how I want my kid to know Santa. Santa is “Crampa” dressed up in red with a beard yelling, “Ho, ho, ho!” and handing out presents. Corryn really loves “Crampa” so it was no problem for her to go sit on his lap even though he still looked like the scary guy she was afraid of just a couple seconds before. I think the reality of Santa is much cooler the myth…and it was clear last night that Corryn agrees.

No Comments »

No comments yet.

RSS feed for comments on this post.

Leave a comment

Line and paragraph breaks automatic, e-mail address never displayed, HTML allowed: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <code> <em> <i> <strike> <strong>