Every year since I became computer literate, I have made my son's Christmas experience a little more thrilling. There's the NORAD site that tracks Santa's progress on Christmas Eve--we log onto that and check the map to see if it's time to hurry up and get to bed before Santa arrives. And then there's the www.emailsanta.com page that we visit.
Shay fills in a few key words like his name, age, where he lives, what he wants for Christmas, then clicks a button to "email" Santa. Santa immediately replies. "Ho ho ho Shay, glad to hear from ya. Mrs. Claus loves Lake Havasu, it's her favorite place to visit when it's cold up here in the North Pole." Etc, etc.
Shay had come home from school yesterday, kinda worried because his best buddy Andrew said he didn't believe in Santa. Now, I'm not quite ready to take Santa away from Shay, it seems to keep him a little more innocent. I didn't know what to say to calm his worries, though. It was his idea to email Santa, so we did after dinner.
Santa mentioned in his email back to Shay that, "I'm sure you're hearing some things from kids at school about me, but don't worry about that." Shay was absolutely stunned.
"He MUST BE REAL!! OH MY GOD! He knew what Andrew had said about him!!"
And what's really neat is, the emailsanta site already knew to stick that in the letter because of Shay's age. Kids naturally start that doubting stuff when they're 10.
We printed the email and Shay put it in his backpack to take to school this morning. He'll show it to Andrew and then that'll be the big buzz around the classroom. "Shay's got an email from Santa...."
In addition to the emailing thing on the site, there's photo galleries of the North Pole, the elves homes, the workshop, Santa's house, and lots of snow. It's probably just a village in Sweden or somethin, but Shay was floored. "Oh my GOD there's Santa's house!!!"
So I guess this means I'm Santa, for one more year....
