Believing in Santa

[jcrod]

When did ya'll stop believing in Santa, or did you ever? I never did, parents obviously didn't play that game with me.

My daughter is 8 and still believes, my wife wants to keep going with it. I'm more like, we need to tell her before someone at school does and she argues with them and then made fun of. Thoughts.

[Oh, Gee!!]

Around 5 or 6 years old.

actually, last year

[SpursWoman]

My daughter (10) figured it out, and gave me all the ways I'd knocked myself off last year to back it up and it was impossible to argue with her. I told her if she didn't believe in Santa Claus, he won't come for her. And to STFU and not say anything to her brother (8), who may be a little skeptical but still believes.

So I barely even got 10 years of pulling one over on them (which I love). :depressed



I personally figured it out when I was about 8 or 9 I think ... I would tease my cat and then run because he'd chase me...and I ran right into the closet with all of Santa's gifts in to hide from him.

:fro

[batman2883]

when i busted my parents putting the presents from santa under the tree and eating the cookies and drinking the milk, i use to sleep in the living room by the tree

[Duncan21]

8 is to young wait until she hits double figures, my parents told me when i was 10, that was the worst day of my life!

[sa_butta]

I dont know about the Santa Claus but the tooth fairy still owes me money.

[SA210]

Santa isn't real????

[batman2883]

i beat the shit out of the tooth fairy once for only leaving me 4 bucks

[BigDaddyMatty]

My parents got mad at me once because I ate the halfeaten brownies that Santa didn't finish.

[samikeyp]

Santa isn't real????

:lol Damn...beat me to it!

[SA210]

My parents got mad at me once because I ate the halfeaten brownies that Santa didn't finish.
My mom didn't even hide the cookies. I thought Santa didn't want them. :depressed

[easjer]

I was 10 or so when I figured it out, but my mom always said that if you don't believe, you don't get gifts, so I kept my mouth shut. There was a raging debate in fourth grade, I recall, with the class divided about half and half. Everyone seemed pretty tolerant.

I do remember when my brother found out, because we all still feel awful about it. We were visiting my grandparents in Alaska, and they took us to Santa's Village at the North Pole, which is a huge Christmas and toy superstore. About half the year, they have a Santa and 'elves' around, but not in the summer. My brother really and truly believed we were going to Santa's house, and when it turned out to be a store was crushed. He accused us all of lying to him and cried about it for days. My mom gets all upset and teary when she thinks about it now.

[SA210]

i beat the shit out of the tooth fairy once for only leaving me 4 bucks
If I was lucky, my toothfairy would leave me a brown colored foodstamp.

[SpursWoman]

but my mom always said that if you don't believe, you don't get gift


:lol

That's exactly what I told my daughter.

[mookie2001]

she could always just find out on the internets

[easjer]

I'm 25 and my mom STILL says that. I pointed out that Jason has been filling my stocking for three years (oh, that sounded kind of dirty. That's not what I mean.) and that Dad and Lisa have given me a stocking, so really, it'd be ok if 'Santa' didn't give me anything. Particularly fruit. That's been hung over the fire. Cause, ew.

[pache100]

When did ya'll stop believing in Santa, or did you ever? I never did, parents obviously didn't play that game with me.

My daughter is 8 and still believes, my wife wants to keep going with it. I'm more like, we need to tell her before someone at school does and she argues with them and then made fun of. Thoughts.

I wouldn't worry too much about her at school. I think you know for a long time before you admit that you know.

When I was about 7, I got a new bicycle for Christmas. And, LOTS of new clothes for my Barbie doll. I never even noticed that my old bicycle disappeared a few weeks before Christmas - hey, it was winter and I wasn't riding it much. Well, on Christmas morning, we went to visit this family that was close friends with my parents (and these people weren't very well off, none of us were, really, being military families in the 50s). The little girl, who I guess was about 4, got a new bicycle, too...and...IT WAS MY OLD ONE! Our dads had cleaned it up and painted it, and it had new tires, but it was definitely my bike! And, she had lots of new clothes for her Barbie, too! And, they looked exactly like MY new Barbie clothes. Then, I realized that a lot of the doll clothes were made from the same fabric as a lot of my clothes and my Mom's clothes (she sewed all our clothes back then). I tried to be really shocked, but deep down, I'd suspected for a couple of years. Maybe it's a little sad when you realize once and for all the truth about Santa...but not really...that's when you get to be part of carrying on the tradition!
I never told anyone about that bicycle until I was an adult.

[SA210]

we usually got things we shoulda had the whole year, like toilet paper.

[pache100]

I'm 25 and my mom STILL says that.

My Mom is 72 and SWEARS that the Santa in the Macy's Thanksgiving Day Parade is the "REAL" one. She will halt everything, all the dinner preparations and whatever else is going on, a little before noon on Thanksgiving Day. And everyone in the house has to assemble before the television to see the "REAL" Santa. :lol

She swears if you don't see him, you won't have a good Christmas.

[SequSpur]

I tell my kids if they don't believe in the spirit of Santa Claus and the purpose for it, they only get the gifts that family and friends give them which on a scale of 1 to 10, the gifts usually rank about a 2.

Santa always has the good stuff.

[SpursWoman]

that's when you get to be part of carrying on the tradition!


Exactly. :)



Santa always has the good stuff



:tu :lmao

[jcrod]

I guess I'm the only one who thinks 8 is long enough, ok. I guess i still got to put shit together half dunk in the middle of the night.

My wife pulls the old, were going to be going to talk to Santa in the next week or so. So you better behave or we will tell him you've been bad. She (daughter) says, I don't believe you talk to the real Santa, and then says she wants proof. Like some hair or piece of his clothing. In her letter to Santa, she even mentions to PLEASE let her parents cut some of his hair off. LOL.

[mookie2001]

I bet Santa can hook up the whitest snow

[SpursWoman]

I guess I'm the only one who thinks 8 is long enough, ok. I guess i still got to put shit together half dunk in the middle of the night.

My wife pulls the old, were going to be going to talk to Santa in the next week or so. So you better behave or we will tell him you've been bad. She (daughter) says, I don't believe you talk to the real Santa, and then says she wants proof. Like some hair or piece of his clothing. In her letter to Santa, she even mentions to PLEASE let her parents cut some of his hair off. LOL.


I have my kids email Santa ... to an email account I made up. So Santa emails them back. ;)

[Guru of Nothing]

she could always just find out on the internets

That's what I did.


Is there a Santa Claus? - a physicist view

Consider the following:

1) No known species of reindeer can fly. But there are 300,000 species of living organisms yet to be classified, and while most of these are insects and germs, this does not COMPLETELY rule out flying reindeer which only Santa has ever seen.

2) There are 2 billion children (persons under 18) in the world. BUT since Santa doesn't (appear) to handle the Muslim, Hindu, Jewish and Buddhist children, that reduces the workload to 15% of the total - 378 million according to Population Reference Bureau. At an average (census) rate of 3.5 children per household, that's 91.8 million homes. One presumes there's at least one good child in each.

3) Santa has 31 hours of Christmas to work with, thanks to the different time zones and the rotation of the earth, assuming he travels east to west (which seems logical).

This works out to 822.6 visits per second. This is to say that for each Christian household with good children, Santa has 1/1000th of a second to park, hop out of the sleigh, jump down the chimney, fill the stockings, distribute the remaining presents under the tree, eat whatever snacks have been left, get back up the chimney, get back into the sleigh and move on to the next house.

Assuming that each of these 91.8 million stops are evenly distributed around the earth (which, of course, we know to be false but for the purposes of our calculations we will accept), we are now talking about .78 miles per household, a total trip of 75-1/2 million miles, not counting stops to do what most of us must do at least once every 31 hours, plus feeding and etc.

This means that Santa's sleigh is moving at 650 miles per second, 3,000 times the speed of sound. For purposes of comparison, the fastest man- made vehicle on earth, the Ulysses space probe, moves at a poky 27.4 miles per second - a conventional reindeer can run, tops, 15 miles per hour.

4) The payload on the sleigh adds another interesting element. Assuming that each child gets nothing more than a medium-sized lego set (2 pounds), the sleigh is carrying 321,300 tons, not counting Santa, who is invariably described as overweight.

On land, conventional reindeer can pull no more than 300 pounds. Even granting that 'flying reindeer' (see point #1) could pull TEN TIMES the normal amount, we cannot do the job with eight, or even nine.

We need 214,200 reindeer. This increases the payload - not even counting the weight of the sleigh - to 353,430 tons. Again, for comparison - this is four times the weight of the Queen Elizabeth.

5) 353,000 tons traveling at 650 miles per second creates enormous air resistance - this will heat the reindeer up in the same fashion as spacecraft re-entering the earth's atmosphere. The lead pair of reindeer will absorb 14.3 QUINTILLION joules of energy. Per second. Each.

In short, they will burst into flame almost instantaneously, exposing the reindeer behind them, and create deafening sonic booms in their wake. The entire reindeer team will be vaporized within 4.26 thousandths of a second.

Santa, meanwhile, will be subjected to centrifugal forces 17,500.06 times greater than gravity. A 250-pound Santa (which seems ludicrously slim) would be pinned to the back of his sleigh by 4,315,015 pounds of force.> In conclusion - If Santa ever DID deliver presents on Christmas Eve, he's dead now.

(NOTE: This appeared in the SPY Magazine (January, 1990) )

[pache100]

...that's when you get to be part of carrying on the tradition!


Exactly. :)

I am 7 1/2 years older than my brother and he is 6 1/2 years older than my sister (I was 2 weeks shy of 14 when she was born). So, I always had a great old time in cahoots with my parents about what Santa was bringing them. It was FUN! When my sister was about 8, my Mom told us that Santa would not be coming to see her that year. My brother told her she was un-American. :lol

From the time he was about 5, he always knew exactly what Santa was bringing him, where it was all hidden in the house, and had played with most of it before Christmas.

[easjer]

Ha! My parents told us they had Santa access two ways - one via the store Santas (who reported back to Santa - we figured out they had fake beards pretty quickly) and the other was the phone number all parents get when they have kids so they can call Santa and update him. As we got older our parents gave us one digit of the number each year.

[mookie2001]

http://www.cs.wisc.edu/~ottumm/images/internets.jpg

[jcrod]

I have my kids email Santa ... to an email account I made up. So Santa emails them back. ;)

Whats the address:
[email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], or [email protected] :lol


Good idea, i'll tell the wife.

[pache100]

Ha! My parents told us they had Santa access two ways - one via the store Santas (who reported back to Santa - we figured out they had fake beards pretty quickly) and the other was the phone number all parents get when they have kids so they can call Santa and update him. As we got older our parents gave us one digit of the number each year.

Yeah, my parents tried that on us, too. They told us that when they bought stuff for us, or when they made stuff (like my Mom making clothes, etc.), that they were "helping" Santa because he was so busy and he had asked them to do this to help him out. We lived in a mobile home when I was a real little kid and I had a really hard time getting through the "Santa coming down the chimney" idea. My Dad finally told me that Santa knocked on the door when you didn't have a chimney and Daddys were the only ones who could hear him knocking...and he would just get up and let Santa in! Well, there was stuff from Santa under the tree on Christmas morning, so I stuck with that story for a few years. :angel

[SpursWoman]

Whats the address:
[email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], or [email protected] :lol


Good idea, i'll tell the wife.


I think it was like [email protected] ... I'll have to check when I get home...every single variation of Old Saint Nick, Kris Kringle, Santa Clause, BigFatBastardInARedSuit weren't available, so I had to get creative.

:lol :lol

[JoeChalupa]

Growing up Christmas was always about going to church and celebrating the birth of Jesus.


And I never bought into the whole "Pancho Clause" story.

[SpursWoman]

Oh, a good explaination for Santa's gifts being wrapped in the same paper mommy has in the big box under her bed:

My daughter actually made this observation when she was like 5, so I told her that Santa must have run out and found mine under the bed. So Christmas Eve the following year, she told me very seriously that we should put out our box of gift wrap and tape and stuff next to the cookies & milk so Santa wouldn't have to go digging under my bed....because digging under my bed was a no-no.

:lmao :makeout

[easjer]

Oh, a good explaination for Santa's gifts being wrapped in the same paper mommy has in the big box under her bed:

My daughter actually made this observation when she was like 5, so I told her that Santa must have run out and found mine under the bed. So Christmas Eve the following year, she told me very seriously that we should put out our box of gift wrap and tape and stuff next to the cookies & milk so Santa wouldn't have to go digging under my bed....because digging under my bed was a no-no.

:lmao :makeout



:lol


In order to make it more Jesus-oriented, our church had a birthday party for Jesus every year. Everyone bought a birthday present for Jesus, that was given to charity, and we made religious themed ornaments and heard the Christmas story. That was cool.

[jcrod]

Oh, a good explaination for Santa's gifts being wrapped in the same paper mommy has in the big box under her bed:

My daughter actually made this observation when she was like 5, so I told her that Santa must have run out and found mine under the bed. So Christmas Eve the following year, she told me very seriously that we should put out our box of gift wrap and tape and stuff next to the cookies & milk so Santa wouldn't have to go digging under my bed....because digging under my bed was a no-no.

:lmao :makeout

I like the way my wife does it. No paper, we lay all the present out of their boxes and ready to play, hence hating doing the shit half drunk in the middle of the night. So when she wakes everything is layed out.

[SequSpur]

We buy 2 types of wrapping paper. The one that we use and the one that Santa uses and we wrap all the santa presents with it and put them in the attic.

On xmas eve, when the kids go to sleep, I go up there and get them.

[SpursWoman]

I like the way my wife does it. No paper, we lay all the present out of their boxes and ready to play, hence hating doing the shit half drunk in the middle of the night. So when she wakes everything is layed out.

I usually leave the big gift unwrapped/setup/put together or whatever...and wrap the smaller things. Before Christmas Eve. :lol

[pache100]

I like the way my wife does it. No paper, we lay all the present out of their boxes and ready to play, hence hating doing the shit half drunk in the middle of the night. So when she wakes everything is layed out.

I grew up in the South, and it was family tradition to open gifts on Christmas Eve. So, we wrapped our gifts to each other and they went under the tree. On Christmas Eve, after dinner, we opened those gifts and they weren't under the tree anymore. Santa came after that, after we went to bed, and what he brought was not wrapped, it was like he just pulled it out of his pack and put it under the tree. And it was there on Christmas morning. So, there was always a distinction between the gifts that were from our parents (like clothes and stuff) and what was from Santa.

[T Park]

Just seeing that so many on here, actually do let there kids believe, and arent being like drunk JCrod and spoil the fun.

Your kids will get made fun of at school for worse stuff than believeing in santa clause jack, and thats part of being a kid anyways, getting over what others think of you.


I stopped knowing there wasn't one at 11, i asked for one of those big train sets with the stryofoam mountains and what not, and i accidentally walked into the garage to see my dad to tell him dinner was ready, and he was standing there with my uncle (his brother) and they were playing with it :lol

Of course i acted unbelievably suprised christmas morning.


I still get a couple gifts from Santa.

Its a way of staying young at heart, and having fun.


What the hell, you live once, why not enjoy it instead of being an ACLU humbug.

[Shelly]

My kids don't believe in it. I think they kinda figured it out because we are never home for Christmas. But they still get presents from him.

For Easter, I would write four clues for them to find their candy. About 4 years ago, my oldest wanted to know why the Easter Bunny and I had the same handwriting. I told him that since EB has big paws he can't hold a pencil and I had to help him. I don't think he bought it, though.

[jcrod]

Just seeing that so many on here, actually do let there kids believe, and arent being like drunk JCrod and spoil the fun.



EH? Where did I say don't go along and spoil the fun Slim.

I enjoy seeing my daughters face in the morning. Granted I don't like putting Santa's toys together, because basically that's the one time during the yr her family gets togther and we usually get plastered with wine and drinks. But I would rather tell her them some mean little punk at school and have her come crying.

[jcrod]

My kids don't believe in it. I think they kinda figured it out because we are never home for Christmas. But they still get presents from him.

For Easter, I would write four clues for them to find their candy. About 4 years ago, my oldest wanted to know why the Easter Bunny and I had the same handwriting. I told him that since EB has big paws he can't hold a pencil and I had to help him[/B]. I don't think he bought it, though.

:lol yeah, that was pretty obvious.

[JoeChalupa]

Just seeing that so many on here, actually do let there kids believe, and arent being like drunk JCrod and spoil the fun.

Your kids will get made fun of at school for worse stuff than believeing in santa clause jack, and thats part of being a kid anyways, getting over what others think of you.


I stopped knowing there wasn't one at 11, i asked for one of those big train sets with the stryofoam mountains and what not, and i accidentally walked into the garage to see my dad to tell him dinner was ready, and he was standing there with my uncle (his brother) and they were playing with it :lol

Of course i acted unbelievably suprised christmas morning.


I still get a couple gifts from Santa.

Its a way of staying young at heart, and having fun.


What the hell, you live once, why not enjoy it instead of being an ACLU humbug.

What the heck does the ACLU have to do with being a humbug?

Does everything have to be political? I sure as hell didn't need the ACLU to tell me there is no Santa Clause.

Now, I know why you were so hesitant to speak to me at the GTG.

You must think I'm a liberal nut-job.

But that is just me. I will now STFU and leave things like this to the political forum. ;)

[Shelly]

:lol yeah, that was pretty obvious.

I think I was in a rush that time, cuz I would usually write them with my left hand.

[Kori Ellis]

I figured out Santa Claus wasn't real when I was 7. I was 90 percent sure of it, but I still held out some hope that he could be real.

The following year in September my grandma died (I lived with my grandparents since I was born). After my grandma passed, obviously nothing was the same at our house, especially that next Christmas. My grandpa was extremely lonely and my sister and I were, of course, very sad because we had lost our mother figure.

My grandpa did his best and he put out our presents under the tree for Christmas morning as usual. About 3 hours after we had woke up, he came up to me and handed me a box (unwrapped) with some model plastic horses that I wanted from Santa. He said, "Sorry, I think Santa forgot to put these under the tree."

I laid down on the ground and started crying .. mainly because I missed my grandma, but also because I had lost all hope that Santa was real.

So, in my opinion, if your daughter believes, try to help her believe for as long as you can.

Growing up sucks sometimes.

[timvp]

Young timvp used Santa to his advantage. After opening all my presents one Christmas, I told my parents I wanted a remote controlled car. Why? Because they hadn't gotten me anything, Santa did.

True story.

:smokin


P.S.

Oh and I got it.

[Mixability]

Young timvp used Santa to his advantage. After opening all my presents one Christmas, I told my parents I wanted a remote controlled car. Why? Because they hadn't gotten me anything, Santa did.

True story.

:smokin


P.S.

Oh and I got it.

Sweet! :tu

[T Park]

What the heck does the ACLU have to do with being a humbug?

Does everything have to be political?

They are humbugs.

No christmas trees.

If you utter christmas you offend everyone.

Winter holiday, no more christmas break.

The PC shit makes me sick.



I figured out Santa Claus wasn't real when I was 7. I was 90 percent sure of it, but I still held out some hope that he could be real.

The following year in September my grandma died (I lived with my grandparents since I was born). After my grandma passed, obviously nothing was the same at our house, especially that next Christmas. My grandpa was extremely lonely and my sister and I were, of course, very sad because we had lost our mother figure.

My grandpa did his best and he put out our presents under the tree for Christmas morning as usual. About 3 hours after we had woke up, he came up to me and handed me a box (unwrapped) with some model plastic horses that I wanted from Santa. He said, "Sorry, I think Santa forgot to put these under the tree."

I laid down on the ground and started crying .. mainly because I missed my grandma, but also because I had lost all hope that Santa was real.

So, in my opinion, if your daughter believes, try to help her believe for as long as you can.

Growing up sucks sometimes.

Wow, touching story Kori, and you are right, Growing up does blow, and the reality after you grow up blows as well, right on.

Such a beautifull story then I read this.



Young timvp used Santa to his advantage. After opening all my presents one Christmas, I told my parents I wanted a remote controlled car. Why? Because they hadn't gotten me anything, Santa did.

True story.




P.S.

Oh and I got it.


You are one Ruth mfer Timvp.

:)

[CoolArrow]

I have never believed in Santa Clause, the Easter Bunny, the Tooth Fairy or even Columbus...but i'm still not sure about Toledo.