Santa Claus

I just love this picture now because just this morning I was asking Luke what he was going to ask Santa for for Christmas. He informed me that "Santa already gave me my present." Not sure what he was talking about I asked him "what did he give you?" (I guess I was mostly thinking he was talking about a previous year, which would just be amazing for a 2 year old if you ask me.) And he told me "Santa gave me candy canes and hot chocket!" How cute is THAT!!! No need to get him anything else, Santa, he's done with that! What a cutie. And no matter how hard I tried to explain that Santa would be coming again and leaving more presents, he just didn't want to hear about it....he has his candy canes and hot chocket! What a nut.


Bradley talked to his hands mostly, and looked at Santa's bells...he talked about his bells afterward.


Charity gave him the letter she had written him. I'm not really sure what to do with this girl about Santa Claus. She asked me last year if he was real, and we had the whole conversation, the tears, the denial, the anger....and I thought we were done with that. But then the other night as I was tucking her into bed she asked, "Mom, is Santa really real or not?!" What do I do with that?! She obviously WANTS to believe that he's real, and I don't want to stop her- I think it's fun to believe in Santa- so I just told her that she needed to watch the Polar Express and then she could decide for herself, but am I just prolonging the inevitable?... making matters worse?....I don't know!!! (well, plus she asks me in front of Kelly, who is perfectly content with believing in Santa, and has never doubted it) I guess I'm not sure where to draw the line. I don't want my kids to get this whole Santa thing mixed up with Faith in Heavenly Father and all the church stuff either. When's a good age to tell them? Or how far do you go??


This is our cute cousin Sydney...she got to come to our party with us.

Kelly was pretending to be nervous beforehand...not sure what that was all about :)

And cute little Noah's reaction was just adorable. He couldn't stop looking at his beard. And actually he was only sitting on his lap for a little over 2 seconds. But he didn't cry!

We had the privilege of seeing Santa Claus at our ward Christmas Party this year! It's been a while since the last time he came to a ward party of ours. The kids were so thrilled to see him sitting there when we walked in the front doors, that standing (or running around the gym and halls, depending on who you are) in the huge line was no big deal. I was happy that none of my kids cried this year :) I guess Luke got to see him up close a couple of years ago when he surprised us and CAME TO OUR HOUSE!! So he's not as scared of him as our other kids have been. (That sure was a special Christmas. The kids still talk about how they were "SO GOOD that year, that Santa came and brought them their presents himself!" Such good memories.) But it's always fun to see Santa.....