Well, I guess Santa Claus was a one year adventure for me. I am not a Santa Claus hater--I just never believed in him. My parents never said he didn't exist, but they never said he did either and they definitely didn't have a distant uncle call me and tell me to get in bed on Christmas Eve because he had flown by in his sled and saw I was still up. Anyway, you get the point...

Now fast forward to me as a mother of three girls. Tori sort of played it like me. Santa is a nice story, but she never actually believed he came down the chimney and such. But Isabelle, well, the stories of Santa brought wide-eyed wonder. And, for me at least, wide eyed wonder is one of my favorite things about having children. So much so that last year I went all in and while Jamie had the girls out I dreamed up an elaborate story about Santa and how he had visited our house while they were gone and swooshed down the fireplace, took their stockings and filled them with treasures and then hid them somewhere in the house and I couldn't find them. Tori was a skeptic, although she played along, but Isabelle fell hook, line and sinker. She started asking every question under the sun and my little white lie got more and more elaborate...I didn't want to lose the wonder in her eyes.

Well, this year I wasn't sure what I was going to do. I wasn't sure I could come up with another story to fool a now 5 year old little girl. But today I learned I don't have to. In an uneventful moment of discovery this morning, Isabelle told me Santa is not real. Santa is your mom and dad. I asked who told her. She said no one, just herself, because last year when there was Strawberry Shortcake bubble bath in her stocking she knows you buy that at Target and Santa does not go shopping--he has a workshop. I didn't argue, cuz why bother with the lie if she doesn't seem to care. And so I sang her "I Saw Ponsi Kissing Santa Claus" and she told me that means she is kissing her dad. She's a smart one.

Merry Christmas!