Santa Claus is coming to town...and Elmo and Mickey Mouse and Mary

So, many years ago my husband said to me "I don't want to follow the whole Santa myth/lie thing with our children". I was mildly devastated. My memories of christmas as a child were so wrapped up in the magic of Santa's-midnight-dash-across-the-Pacific-to-struggle-down-non-existent-chimneys-in-his-fur-lined-suit-in-40-degree-temps-just-to-give-me-presents.   *pant, puff...breathe*    I felt in that moment that i had been a little ripped off, that i wouldn't get to share and re-live my Christmas memories with my children.

Fast forward nearly 4 years later and here i am pondering how i can get rid of this ridiculous Santa idea from my 3 year old's head. Here's how it went....

Mummy-  "Remember when we talked about Christmas last week with Nonny, Harry?"
Harry-  "Huh?"
Mummy- "We said Christmas is someone's birthday? Whose birthday is it? "
Harry-  "Ummmm.....It's Santa's!"
Mummy-  "aarrgh, NOOOO! It's not Santa's birthday, it's someone very special, do you know who?"
Harry-    "Umm......mummy's birthday?"
Mummy- "Well, yes it actually is mummy's birthday but that's beside the point. It's Jesus' birthday! Hooray there will be cake and a party just for Jesus."
Harry-    "What about Mary?"
Mummy-  " Mary was Jesus' mummy but it's not her birthday. Mary is a good mummy but she's just a mummy not special like Jesus (Please don't repeat this to your quasi-Catholic Nonny)."
Harry-  "well...what about Elmo?"
Mummy-  "sweetie Elmo doesn't really have anything to do with Christmas"
Harry-   "He does mummy he does! And soon Santa is coming!"
Mummy-  "Darling Santa isn't coming, mummy and daddy give you presents so that we can celebrate Jesus' birthday!"
Harry-  " No you don't mummy, no you don't. Santa and Elmo bring all the presents mummy. 
              
              Mummy can i something to eat?"



And that was the end of our Christmas conversation. So my fear initially was that Harry would miss out on something special but now i realise that I'm actually going to have a hard time convincing him that the great and powerful media circus is feeding him a big fat Christmas lie. So i continue to tell him about Jesus and we play with our nativity scene and i keep answering questions about Elmo, Santa and Mary. I am now going out of my way to avoid big fat shopping centre Santas, NO ONE is taking the glory for my present buying.

Happy Birthday Jesus. xx

Harry playing with our home made nativity scene

Splish Splash!

So Summer is fast approaching here in Brisbane and that means alot of water play! We've had lots of Harry's friends over lately and spent time splashing around with buckets, watering cans, containers and figurines.

Water play is such a fantastic sensory experience for small children and helps develop early mathematical concepts such as volume and measurement.

And summer wouldn't be complete without a few good watermelon sessions. Yum!