Why Our Family Opted out of Santa Claus

Some would wonder why a family would choose not to enjoy the fun and fantasy that Santa Claus adds to this time of year.  Erin and I like fantasy and fun.  We are both fans of Harry Potter after all.  We have chosen, however, to opt out of adding Santa Claus and his fanciful friends to our holiday celebrations.

It started before we had children.  I watched several years in a row as Erin's sister flew into town a day or two before Christmas and stood in a ridiculously long line for an hour or more with other frantic parents and winy kids waiting to see jolly old St. Nick.  She would stand close trying to hear what her daughter whispered in the old man's ear.  She always worried that whatever the child asked for was the very thing she had already bought and wrapped.

I also observed children who wanted nothing to do with Santa, either because they were young and afraid or older and embarrassed, being forced to sit on a strangers lap so their eager parents could pay way too much money for an average quality photo. I realized that the window of accepting and believing in the big man in a red suit is actually quite small.

About this time I heard my Mother tell about how upset she was when a neighbor boy told me the truth about Santa.  I don't remember the incident myself but apparently Mom was not happy.

Erin and I talked a lot with young parents and heard pros and cons of introducing your children to Santa.  Most of what we heard happened to be cons.  We heard stories of children afraid that some man was going to break into their house on Christmas Eve.  We heard thoughts that said that enjoying these traditions was actually lying to your kids.

We didn't go so far as to think it was a big, fat, lie.  There are ways to handle that when the time comes.  What we decided was it was added stress.  Christmas holds so much fun and so much magic.  It seemed to us that adding Santa meant adding undo stress to an already jam packed month.  So, we decided to skip it and instead make our Christmas focus one of giving and observing the Savior born in a manger.  Yes, we know that we don't know the exact day that Jesus was born but we want to celebrate that he was, who he was, and take the opportunity to be thankful for the gift of a Savior from a loving God.

Now don't take this too far.  We have chosen not to use Santa, The Easter Bunny, etc... in our family observations but we totally respect other families right to celebrate how they want.  We do not think that observing Santa traditions makes you any less of a Christian.

We are not anti-Santa.  At first we didn't take our little ones to see Santa but now if we are out somewhere where there is a Santa and we have time, we give our children the opportunity to talk with him if they so choose.  We enjoy Santa movies.  This time of year you may see one or all of us wearing our Santa hats.  I like decorations that are  Nativity in nature and our tree leans that way as well but I do have one Santa decoration in the house, a candle stick holder given to me in college by a dear friend.

If your children are friends with ours you do not have to worry about our kids, "spilling the beans".  Each year we have a talk with them about how some families think it's fun to believe in Santa.  We tell them that their friends may believe in him and that under no circumstances are they to tell another child that Santa isn't real.  We don't want our kids to ruin the fun for yours.  We respect your decision and we hope you will respect ours too.



After I published this, here are thoughts that Erin added.  "I, personally, have wanted to avoid a situation where my kids discover that someone they believed gave them good gifts, knew when they were naughty/nice, yet never saw, was not real...at the same time I am attempting to teach them about the reality of a God they don't see, who gives good gifts, and who knows when they are naughty/nice. I have communicated with many atheists who see many similarities between the myth of Santa that every adult accepts as untrue and the "myth" of God that (from their vantage point) people naively still believe." 


"I absolutely respect other families' decision to fully embrace the wonder of Santa Claus with their kids. It's definitely not a matter of judging anyone's parenting styles. It is just not something that Kelly and I wanted to do with our kids."

Chopped Walter Style! Season 1

My Brother, Sister, and I all enjoy cooking and we all enjoy watching Chopped on the food network.  My brother, Mark, recently did his own Chopped at home.  His wife gave him secret ingredients and he made it into dinner within a certain time limit.  That was the inspiration for this year's Thanksgiving weekend entertainment with my family.  We were limited on space and knew we would need more time than given on TV so we made it our own.

The Rules:
Each chef was given a specific course to cook.  Their spouse would be their sous chef.  Each chef would have an hour to cook and mystery ingredients were revealed a half hour before so the chef and sous chef could start thinking.  We didn't exactly know what Mom's pantry would hold so some of us did bring extra ingredients we thought we might want.  Each family would bring mystery ingredients for a certain course different then the one they would be cooking.

We made 8 plates for all the adults so all were "judges".  To make clean up easier paper plates were used.  Mom helped gather pantry ingredients and clean up.  We also video taped which made it a whole lot of fun as we did commentary on cooking techniques and "judged" the dishes.

Appetizer:
My sister, Kim, was the chef for the appetizer round.

And the mystery ingredients are: Chicken Leg Quarters, Red Onion, Pomegranate, and Texas Dinner Roll Dough.
Kim had never worked with pomegranate before.  It was interesting that we each got one stumper ingredient. It made it challenging and fun.

Kim and Jared boiled the chicken and started cleaning and cutting greens and the onion for a salad.

The bread was baked as dinner rolls then cut up to make croutons.  The pomegranate was made into a vinaigrette and we were served a lovely chicken salad.

The Croutons were crunchy, garlicky, delicious!  The "judges" were impressed that a boiled chicken salad could be so scrumptious.  The perfect beginning to our Chopped meal.

Entree:
My sister and I did NOT want to do entree so we passed that off to my brother.  He was glad to do it.
Chef Mark and his wife Deana took on the Entree round.

And the mystery ingredients are: Assorted Pork Chops, Eggplant, Oatmeal, and Tomato Soup.

Mark was hoping for pork chops so he was happy.  He had never worked with eggplant before but was really more stumped by the tomato soup.

Mark quickly marinated the pork chops in an assortment of things including red wine and garlic.  He grilled the chops while Deana went to work on the eggplant.

The oatmeal was ground and used to bread the egg plant.  The tomato soup was made into a mushroom sauced and ladled on the pork chops.

The result was moist and flavorful, even succulent pork with a side of crunchy breaded eggplant.  The "judges" were somewhat concerned about the sauce starting so late but it turned out very good.  One "judge" thought the sauce would have been better served with the eggplant but all in all the entree was superb.

Dessert:
I was the chef for the dessert round.

And the mystery ingredients are: Pineapple, Filo Dough, Honey, and Brie Cheese.

I had never worked with brie before and though I had an idea how to use it I wasn't sure how it would melt.  I had several ideas but decided to go with something I was a little more confident would work.  Erin cut up the pineapple and I started cutting the rind off the brie.

I used several layers of filo dough to make desert bundles filled with brie, pineapple, honey, lemon juice, and pecans.  They were tied with lemon rind strips.  Once removed from the oven the bundles were placed on a smear of chocolate and topped with glaze and more pecans.

The brie started melting out before the filo was as crisp as I would have liked it but it was still delicious.  One "judge" said that the chocolate really added to the dish.  Another "judge" commented that while the pineapple was good, this dish would have been even better with berries.

Our Chopped Walter Style was a very fun way to spend time together over the Thanksgiving holiday. We fed the kids their own meal and worked our "schedule" with breaks to take care of their needs.  We all chipped in caring for needs as they arose but also enjoyed adult time.  The commentary was a lot of fun as we tried to sound as much like Chopped judges as we knew how.  We hope in the future to have more seasons of our owns special version of Chopped.  A version where no one actually gets chopped but we all have a lot of fun and good food.