29 November 2011

In the name of Christmas

 

In the name of Christmas I’ve done it all; bullied my brother in law to dress up as Father Christmas and mysteriously appear at the bottom of the garden at an allotted time, nibbled Rudolph size bites out of carrots, posted letters to the North pole, sprinkled magic dust at the bottom of beds and snow-flour footprints at the back door – short of hiring a couple of reindeer to trot past the bedroom window, for the past eleven years I’ve done everything I can to make the fantasy of Christmas a reality for my children. It’s now my twelfth Christmas as a parent as described above, and,  I am beginning to realise, possibly my last. With only one believer left in the family (a seven year old going on forty seven), I am thinking that this time next year everything might have changed. The end of an era..

In some ways, I feel a little relived - as any parent in sole charge of Christmas knows it can be quite a strain. In our house ‘Father Christmas’ has her ears pricked from October 1st for any sentence starting with, ‘I want,’ so, (assuming the item is under £50) she can jump in to the conversation with a not so subtle, ‘That would be a good thing to ask Father Christmas for’. Once an item has been agreed, it goes on the list, and stays there - I won’t be forgetting the Christmas in a hurry when my oldest decided, unbeknown to me, to change her list and was then totally floored when the newly appointed items didn’t appear under the tree.

It was easier when they were very little, we all know that the packaging is the only thing that interests them anyway, but what about the seven year old who can’t comprehend that something is ‘too expensive’ to ask father Christmas for when her best friend is asking for the very same thing and when, quite rightly, ‘Father Christmas doesn’t buy the presents mummy, the elves make them’? Writing the all-important Christmas list on November the first was a real struggle this year as I tried to balance good sense and a realistic budget with the expectations of a seven year old that has been fed on a diet of Saturday morning toy adverts for the past three months and by the look of my credit card bill I’m not sure I succeeded…

All in all I think this Santa Claus is getting a bit old. She’s tired of frantically shushing the eldest if they say the slightest thing that could give the game away, weary of negotiating the Christmas list to make sure it contains gifts that this Father Christmas can afford and approves of, and is not looking forward to a wakeful night comforting the child so wound up  that she literally can’t get to sleep. On the bright side, there’s only another 26 or so days to go and then for me, it could all be well and truly over. Will I miss it? Too right I will!

Sarah

Photograph courtsey of Jum Capaldi: http://www.flickr.com/photos/72744295@N00