Santa....what do/did you tell your children?

Ivrytwr3

9 & 7 year olds at home and both still believe. Should i tell the eldest? I know i should in case he gets teased at school by others who 'know', but i don't want to tell as i want the magic to last as long as possible!!

Mimi_Arc_en_ciel

My Eldest DD is 6 and im wondering whether to tell her there is no santa before someone at school does

What I have told her in the past is that I go to work to earn money, i send some money to santa who then uses the money to make the presents. She always has a HUGE list so i tell her that Santa will look at the list, and look at how much money ive sent him, and then work out what she can have but that out of the (Number) of presents shes picked, she is gauranteed one of them.

mollsnan

My three are now 23,25, and 29 years old. I hated when they were tiny at school and there was always the 5/6 year old who told of no Santa. They were told Santa brings some presents and parents contributed to help buy stuff. I always said it was up to them if they believed, they didn't take the chance of not, but about 10 yrs old didn't want them being made eejits of in school. So we told them about St. Nick and the tradition being carried on by parents for centuries - we called it the Spirit of Christmas and warned they must never tell anyone younger or the Spirit of Christmas (as in the goodwill and happiness etc felt) would be broken. We also told they would have to now be helpers in carrying on this tradition, if we came in with bags and whispered CB (Christmas Business) the older one/ones would quickly take them and hide them upstairs. They loved feeling part of the secret - we asked as they got older if it took away from the excitement etc and they were emphatic it didn't. My eldest once said that knowing all the work that went into Christmas made him really appreciate us - and this was from a then young teenager!

please-let-me-be-lucky

My 2 are just turned 9 and almost 4. As far as I know the eldest still believes. He is the oldest in his year group (yr 4) and I haven't heard any rumblings that anyone else knows otherwise. I think this will be the last year we get out of him though.

I tell mine that we need to send money to Santa as there are now too many children in the world for him to pay for. They will get as many gifts as Santa can afford with what we send. If they are on the naughty list then Santa is allowed to donate our money to children who are so poor their parents can't send any money for them. They also show everyone else their lists before it goes off to Santa so that relatives can help by buying things they really want and then Santa doesn't have to.

They do know that the Santa's they see in grotto's etc aren't the real Santa as he is far too busy getting things ready. They do think they are part of Santa's work force though.

Christmas eve is as special here as Christmas day. We watch the online Santa tracker, sprinkle reindeer dust and leave a plate out. The elves usually leave clean pyjamas on their beds while they are in the bath too (although DS1 suspects this is me!).

I do worry how they will react when they realise it's all me, but I hope they will have fond memories of magical times.

claire16c

jellyhead wrote: »

Wow, but some of the children in year 2 have not long turned 6 :eek:

Mine stopped believing in year 2, and refused to believe in the tooth fairy or easter bunny from day one but he was in the minority.

I asked a school teacher and she said that hers still believed, with her eldest being in year 4. I volunteered in a year 5 class and the teacher there estimated that at least half of the year 5 children genuinely believed, especially the girl who was going to Lapland :j

Anyway, when my eldest questioned me I told him the truth, but the following year he wanted to pretend that he still believed, and we tracked Santa on NORAD, etc.

He was pleased that he had a little brother when he was 9, so he had somebody to pretend with because secretly he still wanted to believe. He is now 17 and still joins in with all the pretence for his brother because he enjoys the magic and fun of it all. Youngest is 8 and will probably have to be told the truth before he goes to high school.

Even when they know the truth it's still a lovely bit of magic to pretend they believe in, for a while at least. My teenager enjoys walking around a nearby village in the snow to see the elaborate charity lights displays, petting the reindeer, etc. and hanging up his stocking before bed. He watches The Snowman with us.

Santa doesn't tag his present, but you can tell it's from him because it's next to the stocking whose small gifts are wrapped with the same paper as the one present he gives.

One thing I've never done is the behaviour modification. My children have good hearts and try their best most of the time, and that's good enough. I don't want them to wonder why the naughty child down the street has been more 'good' than they have.

Yup but we all knew by then. Hence why I find it odd a child 4 years older would still believe, even if it's because they found out as someone else told them.

I also remember at that age some of the girls in our class deciding the bible stories weren't real and we wrote our own bible with a female god and compiled the stories! We certainly weren't a group of kids who would believe things easily! :rotfl:

Money_maker

My eldest still believed when he was 12 and his brother 11. They believed cos I believed and the magic was there for us. I still regret telling them as it broke their hearts and spoiled things for a while. Now we have DD so she shares the magic with me.

Why would anyone want to spoil such a magical time of the year by making out it's just like any other day?

Birdie85

please-let-me-be-lucky wrote: »

I tell mine that we need to send money to Santa as there are now too many children in the world for him to pay for. They will get as many gifts as Santa can afford with what we send. If they are on the naughty list then Santa is allowed to donate our money to children who are so poor their parents can't send any money for them. They also show everyone else their lists before it goes off to Santa so that relatives can help by buying things they really want and then Santa doesn't have to.

I really like this approach! Will have to remember it for my LO when he's old enough (has to be born first too! )

Roz_V

I don't think I ever told my parents that I don't believe. My sister is 10 years younger than me though so I guess when I figured it out I kept quiet for her sake and then the topic never really came up... Probably why "Santa" still brings a stocking full of little goodies every year (I'm 28! :rotfl: ). All main/bigger presents were always from mum & dad/relatives etc.

ETA: I do remember feeling upset for one of my friends who told me that her mum & dad didn't buy her anything for Christmas (Santa brought her everything)

Shushannah

I never really got the Father Christmas thing. We had Santa brings the stocking, but my eldest worked it out by the time he was 5 and my youngest say he never remembers believing. Other parents reactions were very odd, aggressive almost.
We lived in the US when they were 3 to 10 and we didn't do the Easter Bunny which again marked as out as rather awful parents.:eek:

ciderwithrosie_2

I'm sure ours got suspicious when their dad insisted that FC would prefer a can of Stella Artois left out for him instead of a mince pie! :rotfl:

I don't think it's made Christmas any less special though since they stopped believing.