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My youngest DD was PISSED (yes, capital letter PISSED) when she found out Santa wasn't real. She found the "from Santa" wrapping paper in my closet and immediately knew what it meant. She thought we were pulling the wool over her eyes and laughing about it behind her back, like it was a big practical joke. I think she felt this way because her two older siblings are 8 and 11 years older and she was always trying to catch up/keep up with them. We had to do a lot of explaining that it was all about the joy and surprise. I still feel guilty about it.

My kids are 30 and 25 and Santa still comes to our house. We don't put out presents until Christmas Eve so there is so a "Wow" factor on Christmas morning. The Easter Bunny still comes, too.

I don't remember when they each realized the truth but it didn't change what I did at all.

Jpapa, One of my favorite's.

My kids were around 10 when they found out...then it was a big secret to keep from the 'littler ones' who were 8 and 6. We still hide presents until Christmas eve. I will put the presents out and go to bed... and when I get up the dang things multiplied like rabbits during the night.

Word around here for the longest time... "If you don't believe, you don't receive." - translation - keep your mouth shut and go along.

[This message edited by Kajem at 8:28 AM, July 10th (Wednesday)]

I don't remember ever thinking Santa was real.

When I was 5 I thought an Easter Bunny was a breed or species of rabbit that laid eggs. (a platypus lays eggs, why not a rabbit?)

I wanted to believe in the tooth fairy, although I did wonder why a magical fairy lady would pay money for billions and billions of teeth. Today they would surely be considered bio-medical waste. Does she use universal precautions and wear gloves when she collects them?

Threnody, we had the same "Are any of them real?" experience with our youngest.

One night, he asked, "Is Santa real?"

I did the, "What do you think?"

Very seriously and sternly (this is a first-grader we're talking about ), he said, "Level with me."

So I did. I told him about Santa. That Santa was the spirit of Christmas, blah, blah, good-parenting-blah.

And he accepted it with equanimity.

Then, about 20 minutes later, he said, "HEY! WAIT A MINUTE! That means you've been the Easter Bunny and Tooth Fairy, too!"

HEY! WAIT A MINUTE!

I don't even remember when I first found out they weren't real. For us, Santa was fun, but he wasn't Christmas.

That's because my parents limited Santa. Santa filled our stockings (with fruit, a little candy, and a few small, inexpensive gifts). And we each got one present from Santa. And it was never our "big" present - usually a game we had really wanted, or something like that.

The kid-friendly explanation - Santa had to provide gifts for all the kids across the whole world, so he couldn't afford to bring everything we wanted. So he just gave us one present, and left it up to mom and dad to give us anything else.

The explanation from mom years later: Dad worked way too hard for the money to buy those presents to let some fat man get all the credit.

And I don't think any of us kids ever REALLY believed in the Easter bunny. A man who could travel to every kid's house everywhere in the world in a single day and leave presents for all of them was stretching it, but at least somewhat believable.

A giant rabbit that went around filling up baskets with goodies for kids was just too much to believe - even when I was 4! I always kind of knew that was mom.

I was especially suspicious given the fact that the Easter Bunny always left three Fanny May Easter eggs in each of our baskets; two were the flavors we kids liked the best, but the third was always a fruit & nut egg. None of us kids liked the fruit & nut eggs. Mom did, though.

Mom always explained that the Easter bunny must have gotten mixed up again about the flavors we liked - and not to worry, she would take care of the fruit & nut eggs for us. Yeah, nothing suspicious about that!

I never believed either. My parents had promised themselves when I asked they would tell me the truth. They just did not expect me to ask at age three.

They gently told me the truth and asked me how I knew. I had a globe of the earth and realized there was no land at the North Pole.. Just another ocean. Obviously I didn't understand the concept of ice!!!

[This message edited by purplejacket4 at 10:52 PM, July 10th (Wednesday)]