Stocking and/or sack, hung by fireplace or foot of bed?

[WhatWouldVegansDo]

What do you do, and why?

I do a gift bag off the big guy in their rooms, full of socks, undies, books, mini figures, trading cards. General small stuff. I do this because it gives us half an hour when then wake up and so they have a few Santa presents before comin down tofamily. This year they are hanging stockings in the living room but I've made them so they will have choc in rather than getting a selection pack. X

Bed, because then they grab their stocking and come bounce on our bed and we can all open our stocking together while snuggling :). If they were by the fireplace we'd have to get up!

Fire place because the dc don't like the idea of a strange man coming into their room when they are asleep. We come down to open pressies with a glass of wine cup of tea and some nice breakfast :)

Stocking in the living room cos they look pretty hanging on the fireplace

A stocking which will be a leg cut off a pair of tights. It's what I got so when I had DS he got that too. One year He had a fishnet one!

When he spends Christmas with his cousins he gets a pillowcase with presents in which is their tradition.

crafty ours never looked nice. Wrinkly American tan tight legs!

Should add, for us i is also practical since the stove is on 24/7 so hanging stickings above it a bit of a fire risk!

Stocking either in the playroom part of kitchen/dining room, or in the sitting room near the tree.

When we were young, it was a pair of our own socks (us girls wised up to using a pair of school tights relatively young!! The poor boys had to try and get kneelength hiking type scks to compete), with each child having a cushion on the couch, an armchair or the poouffe (6 of us). Early birds got the armchairs, which were best cos there was no chance of early risers snaffling the wrong stuff from adjoining cushions on the couch....

We put one present in their rooms, and stocking and sacks by the fireplace. But sadly this is the first year they don't really believe.

I too think stockings by the fireplace is nice (a la The Night Before Christmas), but I also like the idea of DS waking up and feeling something weighty at the foot of the bed (not that his legs reach that far down!).
I am thinking of hanging the stocking by the fireplace, which the elves will fill with little bits and pieces to open (socks, chocolate, satsuma, puzzles, crayons etc) and sneak into the bedroom with, then Santa leaves a sack of larger gifts by the tree. There was always something lovely about opening little presents in bed, and trying to stay awake to catch Santa coming in. And then the proper gifts, open with the family.
Just need to get our story straight!

Thanks for all the replies!

What I need is a fireplace in the bedroom! :)

We have an out of use fireplace in bedroom, it only gets used once a year so that the red guy doesn't wake them up, or worse they wake at 5, see the stocking and get hyper. The younger ones still forget what day it is in the middle of the night so can be cajoled back to sleep.

We do the end of the bed thing, because that is what FC did when I was a kid, however, the last couple of years when I have been waiting for hours for my DDs to fall asleep so I can assist FC with the job of filling the stockings, I have thought it wasn't such a great idea! But....there is nothing like the feeling of that weighty lump on the end of the bed in the morning that tells you that Christmas is here!

Fireplace downstairs - if end of the bed, we'd be busted immediately.

We used to do it at the end of beds, but it was way too stressful filling them up so a couple of years ago we moved to fire place. I am too scared of a waking child. My 11 year old and 10 year old no longer believe, but the 7 yo, and 5 yo do, and I don't want to ruin it by waking them up in the middle of the night! We always do a bedtime photo next to the fireplace of dc and stockings now. Lovely and Christmassy!

WRT filling stockings- a good tip I read was to buy an inexpensive stocking , but buy 2.
Then you hang one up, and fill the other one up (in secret) and just swap the empty for the full one without being rumbled.

I have gorgeous Christmas Bags for the DC that have little lights on them (DD has a golden retriever looking at the tree, and the lights on the bag are the tree lights IYSWIM)

And I wrap stocking gifts (lots of tape too) to give us extra lie-in time

hang them in the living room on the dresser handles under the tv (we dont have a fire ) and then filled and placed on ends of beds when i go to sleep (about 2am)

Stockings at the fireplace
I've made them each stockings, from fabric they have chosen, and am absurdly proud of them
They are not early risers, even on Xmas day, so we eat cinnamon buns and open stockings usually around 9am.....
It's lovely

We hang the stockings on the bedroom door handles. Cant hang them on the beds or the fireplace as nowhere to hang. Then DD and DS can come into our room we'll unwrap them in the bed together

Stockings outside the bedrioom door, as we foster and aren't allowed to go into the childrwn's room while they are asleep! We have 4 teenagers at the moment and it's quite amusing to see them trip over their stockings as they blearily wander to the toilet. We have just hit our fireplace working for the first time, so there might be a few things in their that fell out of santa's pockets. Nine of them 'believe' but we still do it as if they do, including cheesy photos with the Santa cookies!

I don't think I could risk putting stuff in their room, purely because DS2 still wakes up during the night not bitter at all I'm thinking of potentially having 2 trees this year though so I might do stockings under the little tree in the dining room for after lunch and the main gifts in the living room under the big tree. Sadly no fireplace here

Thanks for the great responses. I especially love wrapping things in extra Sellotape so it takes longer! Genius! :)
And the second stocking so it is ready-filled, though I really like some of the not so cheap stockings you can get!

We don't have a fireplace either. I was thinking of making one specifically for stockings at Christmas.

Meryl, would love to see photos of your handmade stockings!

I have just this year started doing my own stockings handmade they are so easy and v cute, I've been uploadin pics to pinterest

Stockings hanging by the fire so they don't wake up when they're filled. I love how pretty they look, and we all pile downstairs in dressing gowns to watch them. Love it.

Our tradition has always been a sack at the end of the bed. I remember the excitement of waking up and seeing a huge sack full of presents (we had pillow cases) just for me. Now I hope my DDs have that excitement!