i probably did believe in him at some point but mainly i remember trying to convince myself. eg trying to believe the girl at school who asked “but if father christmas isn’t real how do our parents afford to buy all the presents?”, trying to convince myself i’d seen him on his sleigh going past the window
Yeah, this is why we sat our 3 year old down and explained that he isn’t getting gifts because he is good,he is getting them because he is rich. We started to talk through a few flip charts regarding socioeconomic status and morbidity rates but he questioned why we had to shatter the last comforting veil of childhood innocence but at that point we just told him to go to sleep or santa would hate him too.
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Pretty sure I already did this in a poll thread, but anyway:
Did you have a Santa/Father Christmas come round your house as a child?
- Yes
- No
0 voters
If yes, did you evee actually believe in Santa/Father Christmas?
- Yeah
- Nah
- Kind of (please specify)
0 voters
If no, same question:
- Yep
- Nope
- Kinda (please specify)
0 voters
You chose blue like all sensible people did, right?
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Oh, there’s definitely bears in the woods, but I’m not scared!
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Someone bought a little electronic keyboard into school, and I liked it so much that I wrote a letter to Santa asking for it… on Christmas Eve. By pure chance, my parents had already bought me it. So they were able to write me a letter from Santa. This episode extended my belief a few years past where it might have otherwise.
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I have no recollection of ever believing anyone but the people around me were responsible for my Christmas presents.
Not sure I knew any kids who did. It’s only in recent years I’ve found out people actually leave food out for the Reindeer etc and then you chomp bits out so when the kids get up there’s evidence etc.
I definitely believed he was real at one point but my mum kept the charade going for far longer than was dignified. So much time and effort went into maintaining the plausability of it (I don’t think I ever caught her sneaking around). Fair play to her. I stopped getting stockings two years ago at the age of 31 cos I’ve got nephews and nieces now and apparently it’s too much effort for my mum to do everyone’s. I was genuinely starting to think I might get one for as long as my Mum was alive.
That reads like I’m bitter about not getting one anymore lol. It’s the ‘apparently’
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Reminds me of the lyrics this song.
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Czech mate 
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As the traditional St Nicolas song “Zie ginds komt de stoomboot” goes:
“who is good gets sweets, who is naughty the twigs”
with the twigs above a reference to receiving a beating.
Obligatory problematic image:
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As far as I knew Father Christmas brought me small gifts, an annual, colouring book, a puzzle, stuff like that. Nothing too expensive. It was exciting to wake up and think he’d been.
The bigger presents were from my family and they were brought out later in the day.
Did the same with my daughter.
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I definitely believed in Father Christmas. I remember one year looking out of my window for what felt like hours (but was probably about 15 minutes) for a glimpse of him and his sleigh.
My infant school also once had a Father Christmas appear on the school roof - that completely fed my belief. I didn’t question why we couldn’t see his sleigh or hear the reindeer that had been parked on the roof on the other side of the school.
This year it emerged that I once claimed that I had seen Rudolph’s red nose one Christmas eve in the sky when driving up to my Aunts for Christmas…
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Steamboat
According to legend St Nicolas arrives annually from Spain by boat, together with his black assistant. The story was first written down in 1850, when steamboats were the main form of long distance transport.
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I remember having a debate around the lunch room table with the rest of the Year 4 lads about whether or not Santa existed. We’d learned about fractions the week before and my mate Ayman stated confidently that he was 7/10 sure he did. We all nodded like that meant something
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Can you clarify what this means, ta?
Are ‘stocking presents’ from you but labelled as being from Santa? As a kid we had stocking presents that we could open before the main unwrapping - just a couple of small things to keep us occupied to let mum and dad have a lie in beyond kid-at-xmas stupid early o’clock. It was actually a pillowcase on the bedroom door handle. But, as I recall, we never had any pressies labelled as being from Santa - stuff from mum and dad was labelled as such.
Just checked with my mum and she said we never did presents ‘from Santa’.
Did you ever get presents ‘from Santa’?
- Yes
- No
0 voters
Not explicitly, but it was implied - presents from the stocking were unlabeled and appeared overnight while we were sleeping.
Ah, I see.
Our stocking (pillowcase on the doorhandle) presents appeared overnight, too. But so did the under-the-tree presents (apart from a few odds and sods like, say, a tin of sweets from yer neighbour or a pressies from a school pal or summat like that).
Did virtually all of your under-the-tree pressies appear overnight?
- Yes
- No
0 voters