Comments on: Santa Claus, how do you do it?

By: RookieMom Heather

RookieMom Heather — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 18:22:43 +0000

Thanks Kandy, we have updated it every weekday for seven years so it has been A LOT of work.

By: Spammer Kandy

Spammer Kandy — Mon, 10 Dec 2012 14:08:19 +0000

I have learn some good stuff here. Definitely value bookmarking for revisiting.

I wonder how much effort you put to create the sort of excellent informative website.

By: Kat

Kat — Thu, 30 Dec 2010 08:06:47 +0000

My daughters 14 months old so we are still figuring things out, but so far it goes like this.
Santa gets whatever item she asks him for. (I think it’s rude to ask Santa for more than one present) that will most likely be the big ticket item. I think we are safe until we hit the pony stage, and expensive tecnology should be after the santa years right?
Mommy and daddy provide the rest of the gifts, and I think we are cutting it off at 3 gifts each. Her birthday is in October, so she’s still got lots of new stuff. One toy each, one book each, and one nicer than usual essential that I’ve recently said no to in favor of something more practical. (like pink princess light up tennis shoes instead of regular ones, or a nice coat)
My family tends to send gift cards so we will most likely buy their items from the stores in advance and use the cards forbirthday shopping for others down the road.
We do stocking stuffers,’ candy, DVDs, (or I guess iTunes gift cards in the future) and books. These are unwrapped. I’ll have Santa coal candy in reserve though, just in case.
We track Santa with NORAD, leave cookies, milk, carrots for the reindeer, and watch Rudolph before bed. It’s going to be so much fun

By: Kate

Kate — Tue, 28 Dec 2010 21:07:44 +0000

I love the whole wrapped vs. not-wrapped debate going on here.

To each his own, but in my house growing up, gifts from Santa were never wrapped. That’s how we’re doing it for our kids, too.

By: Emma

Emma — Tue, 28 Dec 2010 06:28:28 +0000

Santa wraps his gifts in brown paper that you’d wrap parcels in and a red ribbon…and the elves stamp it with a north pole rubber stamp.

He also puts their name with a rubber stamp…wish I could attach a picture in here.

By: RookieMom Heather

RookieMom Heather — Sun, 26 Dec 2010 00:46:40 +0000

Whit, I can loan you my label maker to put name and year around the string. Nice work.

So, we are in Ohio with the extended family and Santa brought a ton of “stocking stuffers” but no “gift of value” and Holden was extremely confused and disappointed. Guess we’re gonna let SC have the one gift of value from the parents when we get home… some time between getting home and letting the kids in the house. But no more stocking stuffers, I’ve blown my wad and these kids now have 3 new toothbrushes each!

By: Whitney

Whitney — Sat, 25 Dec 2010 22:34:34 +0000

Oh, one more thing. Santa puts an ornament in their stockings. Eventually I write their name and the year on it. My parents did this for me and when I got married, they gave me the whole box of ornaments to get my own tree started. (Side story: they became more observant Jews and stopped getting a tree soon after that.)

I forgot this year and remembered on Christmas Eve. So, I passed off cell phone charms from a nearby Asian market as tree ornaments. Good save, right?! Well, the kids loved them, but they are so small, there’s no way I can write their names and the year on them.

By: Erica

Erica — Sat, 25 Dec 2010 00:41:52 +0000

We had a BIG problem this year when my Ex walked in with the “main” present that I had intended to be from Santa. He announced, “This is your present from Mommy and Daddy.” Needless to say, I engaged in some major damage control!

By: Kristina

Kristina — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 19:49:50 +0000

It’s funny you wrote this because, each year, it seems as if we figure Santa out on the fly. My kids were small enough that it didn’t matter and we could improvise before our Santa rules and traditions became etched in stone. But my daughter just turned 6 and I think this year is going to count. I think we’ll do one big present from Santa with candy and stocking stuffers. And I was wondering this morning if I should wrap the stuffers but I like your idea better.

Happy holidays. Kristina

By: Rachel Zajano

Rachel Zajano — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 07:56:54 +0000

When I was a kid presents from Santa and Mom+Dad were all wrapped, but Santa was careful to use different paper and also (this was hard for tired parents to remember) – to write the names on the tags in a different handwriting than the ones from M+D.

Santa did the stockings too (yes, with toothbrushes and socks), and there was an orange at the toe of each stocking. (This was my Dad’s family tradition which ended up ruining the Santa myth for him at a tender age, when his younger brother thought to count the oranges in the fridge on Xmas eve, and count them again on Xmas morning.)

We did the cookies+carrots eating trick that Whitney mentioned. And, we had a fireplace and would lay out newspaper in front of it on Christmas Eve so Santa didn’t get the carpet dirty. Each Christmas morning there would be two big ashy bootprints on the paper – magic indeed!

I can’t imagine doing all of those things for my son…I don’t think. Maybe just the cookies+carrots.

By: Lynnie

Lynnie — Fri, 24 Dec 2010 01:24:44 +0000

I remember once when I was younger….okay a lot
younger…Santa brought me a watch. Inside was a tag that read,
inspected by elf #34. Very cool…..made me believe for at least
three extra years. I’m thinking I’m going to pull that trick out
this year for my 7 year old.

By: Alissa

Alissa — Thu, 23 Dec 2010 23:52:26 +0000

My husband and I have to discuss this stuff every year as well — he has strange traditions from childhood that involve Santa giving half the stuff under the tree! No way — Santa MAINLY brings the stocking. And maybe a couple of presents — but only things that the child has actually put in a letter to him. And not necessarily the biggest presents. Husband seemed okay wrapping Santa presents in the SAME paper as all the rest. No way! Santa either doesn’t wrap at all (if it is too big or unwieldy — like the pillow pets each kid is getting this year). Or he has special Santa-only paper featuring his likeness. And no writing/cards/tags on those presents. The kids are old enough to recognize handwriting.

Those who haven’t yet seen this site should visit and make a Santa digital message for their child. I think this bought me at least one more year of Santa believing for the older child:

http://www.portablenorthpole.com