Our Santa Tradition

Our annual trip to see Santa has become a special tradition for us since Evan's first Christmas.  Although we do like to stress the true meaning of Christmas (celebrating the birth of Jesus), we feel that infusing the occasion with a little magical joy for children is actually an addition to the celebration versus a replacement.  The day that Jesus was born was infused with God's special magic as He used His unlimited powers to put a magnificent birth announcement in the heavens for all the world to see.  In the days before cell phones, internet, and text messaging, He was able to spread the good news of the arrival of His amazing son even as He was born in such a lowly scene as a simple stable to poor, young parents.  He didn't need birth announcements to send out the joyful news; he had a host of angels at his disposal!  Anyway, I think we all just try to feel a little magic on this special occasion and what could be more magical than the joy and sparkle in a child's eyes as he awakes on Christmas morning and sees packages "mysteriously" delivered during the night?  I honestly really cannot remember a time in my life when I truly still believed that presents were delivered from a man in a red suit who came down a chimney, but I can remember feeling a sense of wonder and magic about waking up on Christmas morning until I was well into my teenage years.  I feel it now when I wake up and get to watch my children's excitement on Christmas morning.  Sadly, I feel that my oldest child's "belief" in Santa will be coming to an end soon because he is just so wise and practical for his years.  He also has a pretty good understanding of the true meaning of Christmas for a child of such a young age.  He was very disappointed this weekend when we learned that due to some rainy inclement weather, the local church down the road would not be putting on their annual live nativity show.  We happily took him and his brother to see our Santa at the mall this Friday night...the same Santa we've seen every year since Evan's first Christmas!  Seriously, I am anxious every year that "our" Santa will no longer be providing this service, and I breathe a little sigh of relief when I get to the mall and see the same friendly Santa face.

Santa ~ 2007

Santa ~ 2008

Santa ~ 2009

Santa ~ 2010

Santa ~ 2011

You'll notice that there are no "bad" Santa experiences captured in the photos above.  Both kids did well in the previous Santa episodes.  I admit I felt like I was missing out on a little something not having a Santa induced temper tantrum of some sort to remember fondly.  Ha!  Well, let it be recorded that 2012 allowed me the pleasure of a true Santa experience to document.  Thankfully, we got some good shots too.

He loved getting to drive some cars while waiting to see Santa.  

Me and the boys ready to go meet S.C.

First, Evan went up and demonstrated to little brother the proper way to sit with Santa. 

And this is what we got when we first tried to sit him on Santa's lap.  He angrily wiggled himself right back down. 

But he was okay when Santa brought out the book with the twinkly pages. 

He kind of hijacked the book. 

One decent shot without the book. 

A decent picture of Brody and Santa by themselves. 

He was fine as long as he had the book to distract him. 

But we got this when the book was removed. I call this a success!  Ha!