The Sociology of Santa Claus

My sister sent me a couple funny links to Santa-related blog posts. A good laugh.

You can see them too: here and here.

I got to thinking (uh oh) about those guys sitting in those chairs for hours on end at the mall. Children from all walks of life sitting on their laps. In various states of friendliness towards fat strangers with candy and presents.

I guess I've been really lucky in this department -- my boys have always been pretty good with Santa. I might need to do a blog post showing my boys with Santa when I get home. In only one picture does Jacob look less-than-happy (2003, he was about 15 months old)...and he just looks peeved, like he has somewhere better to be and Mommy was wasting his time dragging him to Orlando to visit Santa.

From Santa Claus Journey

In 2005 we visited Santa at Southpoint Mall in Durham and that year it was like Santa casual day and he was wearing just a holiday shirt w/ suspenders with his red pants. Weird. What was more weird was that Mrs. Claus plopped herself down on the chair with the boys for the picture. Not against the rules or anything, but it was unusual. That was Timmy's first visit with Santa, he was about 10 1/2 months old. Jacob was 3.

From Santa Claus Journey

Most of you have heard my story of Jacob's most-magical-Santa-experience-in-the-universe at Macy's in NYC in 2005. I remember Jacob asking for a "remote control train" (GeoTrax), in fact. Highly recommend it if you ever have a reason to go to NYC during the holiday season while the kids are still believers.

From Santa Claus Journey

I have the 2008 picture, but not with me as I'm writing this in Florida. I had to go to my online photo albums to retreive the rest of these. And for some reason, I'm not finding the Santa pic from 2004. Enjoy the rest of our Vollmer Santa Journey here.

My husband played Santa Claus one year at our squadron Christmas party. He was the youngest Lieutenant in the unit, everyone pointed to him. He was really sweet with the kids, but did end up with several kids who were scared. I guess it isn't for everyone.

Hats off to all those public Santa Clauses out there -- you have the patience of a saint! I guess that's why you're SAINT Nicholas, huh?