I don’t know about you, but Santa still comes to my house. I am still having a great time coming up with new ways to make the Santa Experience more magical. Last year, we saw snowy boot prints all over my carpet accompanied by a half-eaten carrot, an empty glass of milk, and a few missing cookies. You should have seen the look on my daughter’s face as I videotaped her reaction to what Santa had left behind. There are so many ways to light up your child’s Christmas with morsels of hope in Old Saint Nick. First things first: if you have kids that just don’t believe anymore, then you either step up Operation Santa, or you gently pull them aside before the festivities begin and let them know they are an Elf for the month of December and that you’ll need their help making this experience that much more exciting.
Here’s what you can do:
Make a list so Santa can check it twice. This year, it would be neat to get some arts and craft supplies like glitter, fake snow, special acrylic markers, and confetti and have a day where you and your kids can make authentic Santa lists. After your list is done, take them to a local department store or government building that has the giant Santa mailbox. Drop it in and don’t forget to take pictures. My kids and I always have fun making letters to Santa and to step it up a notch, I create a Santa email so that my girls will receive a one-of-a-kind digital response from their jolly friend in the North Pole. The incentive to doing all of this is that all month long, reminding them to stay off the naughty list has worked wonders for my household, because my girls know the incentive. When they begin to act up, I simply log onto my computer and let them know that I have to send Santa an email letting him know what’s going on, and my older one will corral my little one into calming down. I know this only works for December, but hey, anything that helps your kids be a little friendlier is A-Okay in my books.
After making and sending out the lists, I try to hype up the Christmas music in my home, and then we decorate like crazy. After that is done, this year we are going to make silly Dear Santa videos where we sing random Santa songs with a goofy twist. We also go to our favorite mall and visit who my girls call, “Real Santa”. They’ve come to the conclusion that all of the Santa’s who have a fake beard are really Santa’s helpers because they have realized he can’t be in a million places at once. The “Real Santa” is the man we found at the mall with real white hair, a humbly rumbly belly, and a real white beard. Meeting him and letting him know we will have goodies waiting for him always puts us in a mood of sweet expectation.
Finally, there’s the night before Christmas, and this year I need fresh Santa ideas. I need your help to come up with something very exciting to liven up Operation Santa! Please let me know about your Santa traditions and share your ideas how I can make the Santa experience even more magical than before! To get us started, here is a really neat site to try out this year: http://emailsanta.com/email_santa.asp
