Dear Santa

At our house, Santa gives and receives his Santa mail through the fireplace.  His elves collect the mail at night while we are sleeping, and elves also return responses the same way.  I don't remember which brilliant child thought to contact Santa this way, but it worked, and has continued to work.  (No offense to the U.S. Post Office, but it's so much fun to wake up and check for responses from Santa.)  Sometimes it takes days for him to respond, but he always responds, and usually leaves a treat, so it's assuradely worth the wait. 

Every year the Jarman children go to new extremes to test the reality of Santa.  (Yes, we are aware we need to lay off Mythbusters for a season.)  This year, Joie wrote her letter in invisible ink and hid the magical ink-reading light with which such a note would be deciphered.  Then she just couldn't stand the anticipation of not revealing her letter to me, so she shared the invisible ink-reading light with me and let me read it also.  I hope Santa has one of those.  After writing what she wanted Santa to bring she wrote, "If you are not real, Santa, please say so in your letter back to me."  Can't wait to see how Santa responds to that one!  She also asked if she could also have a phone.  You can't blame her for trying. 

If you've been following our blog for longer than a year you know Santa surprised Nate with a phone last year.  Apparently the buzz in our house this year is:  When Mom and Dad say no, ask Santa.  Megan also asked for a phone.  Jeran just asked Santa for a snow shovel, and asked me if he could hand out flyers to start his own snow shoveling business so he can earn money for an iPhone.  Jeran first asked Santa for drums citing the phone incident of 2008 as justification for getting a gift to which parents have already said no.  "...You gave Nate a phone after the folks said no....," he wrote to Santa.  Crafty kids.  Nate was reasonable in his requests, but tested Santa by daring him to reveal something that only Nate and God know.  (Gulp) 

Stay tuned for the outcome...  Santa set a pecedent that apparently our children plan to take full advantage of.