Military Nesties
meltoine
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Our tech team has launched updates to The Nest today. As a result of these updates, members of the Nest Community will need to change their password in order to continue participating in the community. In addition, The Nest community member's avatars will be replaced with generic default avatars. If you wish to revert to your original avatar, you will need to re-upload it via The Nest.
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Thank you.
Note: This only affects The Nest's community members and will not affect members on The Bump or The Knot.
Do/Did/Would You (kid related)
Re: Do/Did/Would You (kid related)
We definitely feel the Santa love in our house. A few of my friends don't tell their kids about Santa because to them, Christmas is about Christ only. I can understand that, I guess, but I don't see the harm in Santa if you don't let your kids get overly-materialistic about it.
I was thinking about this the other day, what I would do when my hypothetical kids figure out I lied to them about Santa. I was thinking I would just tell them that its an age old tradition, and they can lie to their kids when they have them, lol. (mostly kidding, random Jill thoughts)
We will probably tell them the whole Santa lie. I think its cute and sweet. Unless you think too much about telling kids a fat man sneaks in their chimney and eats cookies, but leaves gifts AND he has been spying on them all year long. If you think about it like that, its creepy.
I changed my name
L still believes in Santa; and this makes my heart so happy I cannot begin to tell you. To me; it's a little bit of the part of the magic that makes Christmas special. She does know the "real reason for the season" and I'm actually amazed that at 8 she clings to Santa. She knows that fairies aren't real, etc. but somehow the characters of the holidays are still magic in her eyes.
I don't plan to tell her the truth; she's a smart cookie and will eventually figure it out on her own like I did.
Absolutely. Its a major part of being a kid. The innocence of childhood is fleeting, I want them to enjoy it.
Not surprisingly, we plan to take the same route. Santa will be believed in and he'll bring her a nice gift.
I'm all about Santa. I think it's way fun for the kids, and I think the spirit of Santa is a beautiful thing.
I think my parents did an excellent job of keeping the focus on Christ while still having light-hearted fun with Santa. The whole month was full of Christ-centered activities, scriptures, and service, and we read Luke 2 and acted out the nativity on Christmas Eve. On the other hand, we also did cute reindeer crafts and whatnot, and even had an elf that peaked to make sure we were being good (an old family tradition). Our one "big" present every year was from Santa, while other gifts were from family members. M and I plan on doing the same thing.
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Exactly.
My Blog
This exactly!
I don't particularly care either way and would be content without the pressure of maintaining a lie, but Joe is a firm believer in that it's a normal part of childhood. Since my childhood was anything but normal, I'll do my best to default to Joe on issues like that. He turned out to be a well-adjusted adult without any emotional scarring.
The issue in my family actually happened when my mom told my neice, who was three at the time, that Santa thought she was a bad kid. My sister had to tell her hysterical child that my brother and I are Santa and that we unconditionally love her, etc, and that my mom has no bearing on whether or not she got to celebrate Christmas. The happier solution here is that my kids just won't know my mom. Viola!
Can I ask, was there a particular reason your families didn't do Santa? Just curious.
I grew up Seventh Day Adventist. Christmas is a pagan holiday. Jesus was born in the spring. The sheep would have been in a massive storage building/cave and not out in the fields. They combined the pagan celebration with the religious one.
Don't even get me started on upside down xmas trees.
I decorate for Christmas now and my family celebrates it now because they are less intense about it.
I find 7th Day Adventists fascinating LL! I learned abot it after I read about this guy
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Desmond_Doss
My parents never saw fit to tell me or my brothers about Santa. Because of that, that's all I know and that's how I would want it to be for my kids.
DH grew up the opposite way. His parents told him Santa was real until he was old enough to know better.
Strangely, I just asked DH about this the other day, and it sounds like we're going to have to duke it out with each other when the time comes. Apparently we both feel very strongly in favor of the way that we were raised.
Does anybody know of a good compromise for this?
We are confused with Jews and LDS a lot. SDA is a special kind of religion. It was hard to explain to kids why I couldn't attend their birthday party because it was on the sabbath. When I got a job I was not allowed to work from Friday night to Saturday night. This is also why I eat mostly a vegetarian diet. Now that I'm not SDA I still can't try bacon or pork because it is a psychological thing now.
I know that you addressed this question to LL, but I'd like to chip in an answer as well.
My dad is from China. Christmas and Santa as we know them did not exist there when he was a kid. American style Christmas was a "new" thing for my dad when he moved here and over the years he's gotten used to it.
My mom grew up in a really religious family. Each kid, at most, received one present, and it was very clearly from mom/dad/sister/brother/whoever. I think that my mom also didn't want to lie to us about anything.
I never really felt lied to as a child after I figured out the reality behind Santa. Maybe because my parents didn't make a huge deal about Santa. Gifts from Santa appeared under the tree on Christmas morning and our stockings got stuffed, but we didn't leave out cookies, or try and wait up to catch him.
I think part of why it is still such a special thing for me was how my mom handled it as we got old enough to catch on to the myth. The year I figured out it was a tradition rather than a reality, Mom had me stay up a little later and help her with the Santa gifts for my younger sister. It was a lot of fun to see the excitement on her face Christmas morning and know that I'd had a hand in helping create that joy and wonder for her.
We're doing Santa when we have kids. My grandparents would always sleep over the night of, and my grandmother would stay in my room & my grandfather would sleep on the sofa next to the tree.I'd leave Santa a note and cookies (one year dog treats for the reindeer) Every year she'd wake me up and tell me to listen, that I would hear sleigh bells and hooves on the roof. When I was older I found out my grandfather would write me back as Santa and eat the cookies, and my dad would go outside with bells so I would hear Santa's sleigh.
I treasure those memories more than anything. One year I walked downstairs and saw mom and dad wrapping/arranging gifts and mom told me Santa was on vacation in Hawaii and asked them to help him out. After that I kinda got the idea, and I was never mad..but I do miss the bells.
A coworker gives the kids 3 gifts each - just like Jesus got 3.
All the special memories everyone is sharing are so neat! Thank you for sharing!
We will do the Santa. Both our families did it as kids. My parents never made a huge deal of it, we got our big gifts from Santa and our stockings were always stuffed. But other than that it wasn't a big thing. Every Christmas morning before opening gifts we would say a prayer and thank God for the birth of our Savior. I want my children to understand the reason of the season more than thinking its a gift grab.
E is on board with pretty much anything I decided to do regarding our kids because for some odd reason he has very little memories of his childhood. Although he had a lovely happy childhood.
Santa will definitely be in our house. I grew up with Santa bringing my brother and I a few gifts and usually a "big" family gift that were left unwrapped under the tree. I remember setting my alarm for 3am and my brother and I would sneak downstairs with flashlight to see what Santa left. It was so much fun as a kid and I didn't feel mad or sad or angry when I found out he wasn't real. I was just worried I would get fewer presents!
M grew up without Santa or a Christmas tree (or any Christmas decorations whatsoever). He was actually told that Santa was the evil man in the red suit.
No Easter Bunny, Tooth Fairy, Halloween, etc. But presents were okay, lots and lots of presents.
Yes we do Santa.
I LOVE LOVE LOVE how the Germans do their version though. St Nicholas comes on December 5th and Christmas is all about celebrating Christ's birth.
Unfortunately, DD does too much on base and FSS has Santa sightings past the 5th. So we stick with the American traditions, though we stress ST NICHOLAS over Santa Claus.
We also end our Christmas day with a birthday cake for Jesus.
I knew someone who did this too and thought it was a great idea. Until I just bought way too many things for a 5 month old. In my only defense we don't have a ton of toys for her because she really wasn't "into" toys until very recently.