HO HO HO!!!!!!!

I got such a kick out of this post that my friend Portia wrote about with her children's terrible experience with visiting Santa. I laughed so hard when I read it! It got me thinking back to the last 13 years of my own experiences with my children and Santa Claus. We have always been very fortunate to have wonderful Santa Claus experiences each year. With the exception of one that is!!....Faith's first Christmas home. I also cherish the photos I have of each of my children's first photo taken with Santa. Each Christmas I set them out to display. For the last few years I have been meaning to get matching frames for them and this year I finally did!!

Dean's first Santa photo at 4 months old. I remember being so excited to get this photo taken of our first child with Santa! We went to the mall in Dallas (where we were living) and he was just the most perfect Santa. Just like you would imagine the real Santa to look like. He held Dean right up just like a doll. I love this photo.

Reed's first photo with Santa at 5 months old. This was at the Annapolis mall we went to while living in Maryland. Again just a great Santa I thought and I loved the nautical theme. I was so glad I took the boys when they were babies to have their photos taken with Santa, because this was the only time they actually sat on Santa's lap. After that our visits with Santa became them standing at at least a foots distance!

And here is Faith's first official photo taken with Santa at 2 years old! This was at the mall here in California. The same mall she has been going to see Santa now for the past 4 years! This just amazes me that we have been in one place this long! She adored Santa and she still does. Each year she is so excited to go and see her old friend. She talks to him like she has known him all her life! My favorite experience of her with Santa was last year when Santa actually came to the house to see her. You can read about it here.
Faith's first experience with Santa (her first Christmas home) was one of those Santa nightmares!
We were living in England and I REALLY wanted to get that photo of her with Santa. Finding Santa in southern England was not so easy. I had just about given up on getting that photo when I heard he was spotted at our local nursery/pottery shop that we loved going to. We anxiously took Faith to see her first glimpse of Santa................

It didn't go too well!!! I have to say he was the scariest Santa I ever saw and Faith thought so too! He also reeked of alcohol! I can't believe I was that desperate to get Faith's photo with a drunken Santa! Bad Mommy! She refused to sit on his lap which was way out of character for her, but can you blame her! Yep, that was a Santa experience I am glad she can't remember!

The boys were only 2 and 4 years old when we packed up and headed to Europe to live in Spain.
The base where we were stationed always had a nice Christmas party for the kids and of course Santa was there! As you can tell by the distance that Dean is keeping and by Reed's face they were always leery of Santa.

A Happy Christmas to all and to all a good-night!!!