What to do about Santa Claus

Since 'tis the season, I thought I would share my thoughts about this whole Santa Claus thing so that friends and family can understand where we are coming from! We are teaching our kiddos that the legend of Santa Clause is not real. BEFORE you grab the pitchforks, hear me out! I've included the "Top 5 Reasons" why we don't do Santa later in this post.

However you chose to celebrate (or not celebrate) this season is your decision and I completely respect that.

Before we had kids, John and I decided we were not going to do the whole Santa thing. It came from a place of wanting our kids to understand the real meaning of Christmas instead of being distracted by a the American version of Santa, the man in the red suit.

I'm sure a lot of people who are reading this may be thinking things like, "How could you not let your kids believe in Santa! You are robbing them of their childhood. Santa should be a part of the magic of Christmas! Your kids will ruin it for everyone else."

Don't get me wrong, John loved Santa as a kid. He turned out great and loves Jesus. Heck, he thought Santa was real until he was 12 because he got to vacation every summer in Tahoe with a other time-share resident who bore a remarkable resemblance to the man. I don't believe Santa should be banned from Christmas by any means! We have Santa decorations in our home, I might wear a Santa hat, and we will probably let our kids watch Christmas classics that feature Santa.

For some families, Santa is really important, and I respect that. Some families don't celebrate Christmas, and others like us don't celebrate Santa. This year is the first year Caleb and I have been able to have really amazing conversations about Christmas and the greatest gift of all: Jesus! It has really reaffirmed that this is how we want to celebrate Christmas as a family.

I figured I would lay out my top 5 reasons why we chose not to do Santa in our house. Hopefully this helps people understand us better!

Why we don't do Santa:

1.  Jesus is why our family celebrates Christmas

Jesus came as the most amazing gift, and our family and many others celebrate his birth on Christmas.  From what I've seen, Santa is a big distraction to kids. They spend hours writing their list to Santa, talking about him, focusing their energy and efforts conspiring a way to catch him, and debating the validity of all the magical things they have heard Santa can do. I don't want my kids to be confused about the purpose of Christmas. I want our kids to constantly talk about Jesus' birthday, what gifts they are going to give Jesus, and how they are going to spread God's love to their friends, family, and strangers who need to be shown how much God loves them. There are so many rich and wonderful opportunities to expand our children's capacity to love during this season, and Santa causes kids to be "me" focused and a bit self-centered at times. As cliche as it sounds, Jesus is the reason for the season.

2. I don't like lying to my kids

We firmly believe that telling the truth to our children is incredibly important for building trust and connection. To be blunt, the tall tale of Santa is a lie. I am not comfortable misusing the trust we are building with our kids by lying to them about Santa. If you believed in Santa as a kid, I'm am sure you remember being mad at your parents and going through the kid-version of the 5 stages of grief when you discovered Santa wasn't real. When we read stories from the Bible, my children listen intently. When we talk about God and Jesus, our children believe what we say. In the future they will have so many questions, doubts, personal beliefs, and hopes about God, the Holy Spirit, and Jesus. We want to walk with our kids through the natural process of spiritual discovery with a good track record. We want our children know us as truth-tellers who are honest and trustworthy. Our family will be talking about Saint Nicolas and his life and ministry. He was a kind man who loved Jesus and sought to help others by providing for their needs in secret. We will talk about how we will get to meet Saint Nicolas when we are in heaven together.

3. It's a lot of work

Goodness Santa requires so much parental involvement and work! You have to remember all the things Santa can and cannot do, answer the incessant, "How does Santa (fill in the blank)?", and eventually run interference when your kid discovers clues that YOU might be Santa. Personally it sounds like more time and energy than I'm willing to invest to convince my children that something that is not real is in fact real. Now you might be concerned that my children will spoil your fun if your family celebrates Santa. Don't worry! From what I've heard, it's usually the kids who just discovered that Santa isn't real that are on a mission to spread the gospel of "Santa isn't real!!" to all of their friends who have been fooled. I don't think that our parents were concerned about kids who were Jewish, Jehovah's Witness, or whose families did not celebrate Santa to ruin it all for everyone else. Nevertheless, we will make sure our kids will respect and protect your Santa secret for your children.

4. We pretend in other ways

I can understand the allure of Santa from a parent perspective in regards to fostering imagination and make-believe.  Developing my children's imagination and their pretend-play skills is a high priority for me. However, fantasy and reality need  clear boundaries for kids' imaginations to be fully developed! There are many different thoughts on the matter of fostering imagination development (just compare a Waldorf vs. Montessori approach). We gravitate towards the idea that is is the security of reality allows children to enter into wonderful pretend-play scenarios and imaginative worlds. When kids know what is concrete and real, and what is fantasy and pretend, their minds can soar. It's a lot more fun for me to pretend with my kids (with them too knowing that we are pretending) than for me to be the only one who is in on the secret. I plan on soaking up the joy of their imagination, just not with Santa.

5. Santa isn't fair
Santa allows kids to believe that they can get whatever they ask for, as long as they are good. How do you explain to your kid why Santa brought every toy imaginable to one of his or her friends, and another friend got a few much needed needed school supplies from the dollar store? Maybe your child has their heart set on the ridiculously priced "it" toy of the season and you lost your job and will only be able to afford some simple art supplies. Because Santa encourages children to be "me" focused, there may be lots of tears on Christmas when children didn't get what they asked Santa to bring. This isn't fair to parents or kids! We want our kids to develop a joyful and giving spirit, and to become gracious recipients of gifts. John works hard every single day to make a living to provide for our family. I want our kids to be thankful for the time that he puts in at work that allows us the opportunity to buy them good gifts. Another thing that the Santa culture lends itself to is parental shame and guilt about our gifts! Materialism is so tempting around Christmas. When we see on social media all the fantastic presents that a friend's kid got for Christmas, we can't allow ourselves to feel "less than" for not getting our own children gifts that are more reasonable for our budget and lifestyle. For Christmas, our family plans to stick to a $50 per kid gift budget. This is something that may grow over time, but it is something that we will tell our children to keep in mind when they are writing their Christmas lists for us.  During Christmas we want our kids to be thankful and appreciative, as well as generous towards others.

I hope this helped a few people understand where we are coming from (and maybe drop the pitchforks) so that you have a better idea of our hearts.

Please feel free to share this if it seems to you...

Love,
Ebey and John