A little Christmas truth.

I think I have shared that my boys do not believe in Santa.  Kat grew up a non believe and I compromised as a way to appease her on the Christmas tree issue. (Remind me to tell you about the first year I did a Christmas tree with her).  This means we also eschew the whole elf on the shelf thing.  I have also recounted how challenging it was to convince my Matthew that it was not his job to tell his friends “the truth”

Last night at church a friend was saying that she cannot find her elves this year.  She has two children; a boy and a girl, ages 13 and 12, and she has 2 elves for them. She has searched high and low and cannot find the elves from last year.  She has said that if she can’t find them by the 5^th (which is when you are supposed to get them out?) then maybe her kids have out grown them.  It was an interesting conversation to be a part of.  How do you handle it when your children outgrow Santa?

My friend shared that she had asked her daughter if she was going to make a list for Santa of her Christmas wishes, and she got a typical pre-teen eye roll.  She asked the same question of her son and he responded “heck YEAH!”  I don’t know if his response is born of belief, or just a practical one.  If it were me then as long as Santa was bringing me gifts, I would be making lists.

I shared this story with the boys this morning and asked if they thought their friends still believed.  Matthew laughed and chimed in that he was sure his former classmate has known the truth since Kindergarten. I asked him if he was guilty of ruining his friend’s Christmas. Matthew was quiet for a while, then he assured me that he would NEVER have told anyone that Santa wasn’t real.

Yeah right.  That’s my boy, wrecking Christmas for his friends since 2001.