I will always remember this Christmas as the one where we had girls in both worlds of wholeheartedly and innocently believing, and growing into an understanding of the bigger message when it comes to Christmas. Oddly enough, I enjoyed them both immensely.
Let's start with Sydney. While this was her very first Christmas party at the preschool, thanks to Ireland and Brigitta, it was my fourth.
The songs were all familiar and so I knew when Santa would be making his entrance and planned to catch Sydney's reaction:
Oh what a reaction! The joy is just bursting out of her little body as she wildly claps and bounces on her toes and wildly waves at St. Nick. I particularly love how she presses her hands together and puts them up by her face- as if he was an answer to her prayer.
At the other end of the spectrum was Liesel, who's suspicions about Santa Claus have been around for a while. As her questions increased, I finally had a private sit down with her to set the record straight. Is Santa Claus real? Absolutely. There really was a Saint Nicholas who slipped coins into the stockings that were drying by the fire for poor children. It is that spirit of giving and kindness that keeps him alive today. Is a fat man in a red suit going to slide down the chimney tonight? No. But while we're on the subject, the Elf on the Shelf is just for fun to help maintain that magic... and Dad and I are sick of doing it. So now it is your responsibility to move the Elf on the Shelf every night! Doesn't that sound like FUN?!?!?
Actually, when Liesel found out it meant sneaking out of her room after everyone had gone to bed and doing something creative with Lucy, she was ecstatic. I have to say for the first time I really, really enjoyed the Elf on the Shelf this year. The twinkle in Liesel's eyes when her sisters woke her up to tell her what Lucy did last night was just precious. It felt like we had a comrade in arms. Regrettably, I didn't capture all that Lucy did this year but here are a couple:
She hid in the silverware drawer.
She managed to anger the little army men in the house.
Lucy also made a snow angel out of sugar, tp'ed the Christmas tree, cuddled into a jar, pooped chocolate chips, wrote on the bathroom mirror with lipstick and built a house out of various Christmas books.
One evening Liesel came to me a little panicked- she overheard Ireland telling Dad that Lucy's handwriting looked an awful lot like Liesel's. How was she going to keep Ireland from finding out? I couldn't help but smile at the consternation that was once mine. Ah sweet Liesel, someday she will find out and you will see that it's not so bad.
With that, I'd like to include this lovely editorial originally printed in 1897 known as Yes, Virginia...
We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of The Sun:
Dear Editor—
I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Santa Claus. Papa says, "If you see it in The Sun, it's so." Please tell me the truth, is there a Santa Claus?
Virginia O'Hanlon
115 West Ninety Fifth Street
Virginia, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Virginia, whether they be men's or children's, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.
Yes, Virginia, there is a Santa Claus. He exists as certainly as love and generosity and devotion exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Santa Claus! It would be as dreary as if there were no Virginias. There would be no childlike faith then, no poetry, no romance to make tolerable this existence.
We should have no enjoyment, except in sense and sight. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.
Not believe in Santa Claus! You might as well not believe in fairies. You might get your papa to hire men to watch in all the chimneys on Christmas Eve to catch Santa Claus, but even if you did not see Santa Claus coming down, what would that prove? Nobody sees Santa Claus, but that is no sign that there is no Santa Claus. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world.
You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a veil covering the unseen world which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, can push aside that curtain and view and picture the supernal beauty and glory beyond. Is it all real? Ah, Virginia, in all this world there is nothing else real and abiding.
No Santa Claus! Thank God! He lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Virginia, nay 10 times 10,000 years from now, he will continue to make glad the heart of childhood.
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