Santa

When I was little on Christmas morning we came downstairs to see if Santa had arrived  and we had to wait for my dad to get out the camera. We couldn't look under the tree until he was ready. I continued that tradition with my kids.

The other tradition I continued was that Santa's toys were under the tree unwrapped. I guess my mom thought that if Santa was just pulling them out of his bag, they wouldn't be wrapped. I always found it so interesting when other kids would talk about how they 'unwrapped' Santa's gifts.

Well, when Josh was little, about the age of four, he got so excited about Christmas that he could not sleep. He kept calling us about every hour starting at 1 am that he couldn't sleep and had Santa come?

Finally at 3 or 4 am I got up with him and took him downstairs so he could see his toys. I guess I thought let's get the suspense over with and then maybe he can go back to sleep, knowing Santa did bring him toys.

I will never forget how disappointed he appeared when we walked downstairs. I truly think he thought the entire Toys R Us store would be underneath the tree. He had some trucks and I can't remember what else. He looked at them, touched them, and I said, "Can we go back upstairs?" And he agreed.

He went back to sleep and when Natalie woke up we went downstairs and of course he didn't act excited because he had already seen his gifts.

He never woke us early again and I always felt he was reserved, keeping that excitement under control, knowing not EVERY toy he wanted would be under the tree.

Ah, the disappointments of childhood.