When the dc were small, if we saw a robin, we used to wonder if it was “Santa’s robin”. Sometimes I’d be the only one to spot Santa’s robin at a time when they were being particularly lovely to each other. Santa loves hearing about nice children.
I don’t believe in drawing attention to naughty behavior. If you keep noticing the nice behavior the dc will do more of that to get more notice.
They only heard about the naughty/nice thing when they started school and ds2 was quite worried about a (sn) child in his class who was looking like a candidate for coal on Christmas morning. I told DS that it was just a catchy line in a song but that Santa most definitely didn’t work like that (not had he ever got stuck in a chimney)
I was proved right when said child reported back on her Christmas presents. The following year we visited a fabulous Santa who told them that it had nothing to do with being nice or naughty but that every time they showed kindness, it helped to make the Christmas magic more powerful and obviously Santa needs a LOT of magic to fly around the world in a single night. I think it’s far more productive to encourage dc to feed the birds, fetch granny’s glasses, and help around the house than to cultivate shame, worry, guilt... or worse smugness.
I was told one year about someone’s elf but we agreed it was unlikely Santa would be able to spare many elves at such a busy time of year. Anyway, the robin I spotted while they were helping to sweep up the leaves had flown off due North, so Santa probably knew all about them.
I can’t really see how to maintain the pretence when the shops are flooded with elves, elf accessories and books of ideas for what to do with them. And I think that once one piece of “magic” is debunked the whole house of cards topples.
DS2 doesn’t believe anymore but would like an elf now anyway for fun. We won’t have one this year for slightly complicated reasons but maybe next year. As long as he’s the one jumping out of bed because he’s forgotten to move it 