Shit, my child has just trumped me with Santa. What the hell do you say in this instance?

[justanotherneighinparadise]

My seven year old wants a certain expensive toy. Four year old wants a different version of it. I say, woah kids this stuff is crazy money. I don’t think it’s worth the price tag in terms of the play I think you’ll get out of it, so I’m happy to buy one version but it will be a shared toy for both of you.

Seven year old then says it’s okay, he’ll put it on his Santa list and Santa can bring it. Four year old says he’ll do the same. What the fuck was I supposed to say to that?!!!

How ridiculous. My children often put expensive toys on their Father Christmas list and I just say that it's too expensive to be a Father Christmas gift. They still believe at age 9 and 10

I'm surprised you've got away with that for so long. Dd pulls that one every, single year

You’ve said you would be happy to buy one version for them to share, so I would go with that route, possibly. Perhaps with a small note from Santa saying how he knows they will share nicely, etc. so don’t need one each? And then next year lay on thick how they shouldn’t ask for anything too big/expensive again as Santa would think it was greedy.

Like a pp, I was always told to thank Santa for last years’ gifts in my letters, and not to be greedy or I might not get anything. Mind you, never stopped me writing out half the Argos catalogue.

I had this!
We said Santa has a certain budget.

Well, there’s only 42 sleeps/ 6 weeks to go. The elves might not have time to make something so complicated/ big at short notice as they have all the children in the world to make for. Best put some alternatives on the list as back up.

Santa doesn't do duplicates in this house, if you already have something he's unlikely to bring you something similar. He also takes your list as ideas but sometimes goes off piste and does his own thing.

Santa has a budget, he can't afford £40 each. How budget is £20 bit we could tell him you are going to share

We just tell ours that Santa doesn’t bring something he knows your parents wouldn’t be happy with (a pony, a swimming pool etc), they have bought this without question for years

@parrotonmyshoulder

Ours were told that we have to pay Santa for the things he brings. Otherwise how can they understand that some children don’t get much while others get loads? Can’t let them think it’s because they’ve been ‘nicer’!

Yep. We say that too.

I remember when I was wee my grandad (jokingly...well kind of 😂) telling me that santas sleigh had been shot out of the sky by pirates somewhere over Australia. He'd managed to save a lot of the presents but not all of them and some of them had landed in the sea. Hence why I the big present I'd asked for hadn't been under the tree that Christmas. You could always give them that explanation of christmas morning as to why their gift isn't there 🤔😂

We've always had the 'write absolutely all and everything you would like' on the lists. In the past some of the things haven't even existed! They know that 'if you're lucky you'll get something from the list, or Santa might give you something else that you will like'. That way you have plentiful ideas when other people ask, and also that they have no expectation of receiving all or anything on the list.

Everyone is happy.

Santa also can’t do anything branded because of copyright in case he gets sued by Disney/ Apple/ nintendo/ etc.

Santa doesn't like to spoil children too much

@leesmum

Just say you send Santa the money and you haven't got that much! That's what happened to me and all my friends when I was a child.

I told mine that there were so many children that particular year that would have nothing without Santa, and he had to make the toys stretch to far more children. Once, they were adamant about some special thing, and I told them that perhaps Santa could bring it, but it would be the ONLY present...all those other poor children, you know.

Santa can only bring things that the elves can make. So no electronics. This year they're particularly tight for time as some have been off self-isolating, so even some things they'd normally make aren't going to be ready in time.

We send the money to Santa too.
Also, Santa doesn’t deliver everything on the list either.

Santa has only ever brought the stocking here, pretty much everything else is labelled correctly. We / other family worked hard to afford those gifts - credit where credit is due!

We told ours that although Santa brings the presents we still have to pay for them so the budget would be limited by what's in our bank account.

@RJnomore1that is genius, never thought of the copyright thing before!

Like others have already mentioned, we just tell ours that we still have to pay for the Santa presents.

My children write a list of ideas and then choose one thing off the list and and ask for that and surprises in their Santa letter.

Makes them focus on the one thing they really want. I’ve always told them Santa would think they’re greedy if they asked for a list of toys.

We usually do a joint present from us and then other things from list from us under the tree but they don’t get the whole list.

I don't get why people panic about things like this
It's still up to Santa what he gives
Whether that be because of money or time or because he thinks he'll leave it up to mummy to get this
And yes just because it's on the list doesn't mean they'll get it. Lists are just ideas

This is why we always told ours Santa just brings the stockings of tat and the main presents come from family

Same here. I think we make more of a rod for our own backs by making everything from Santa TBH.

this has served us well with regard to expectations

And it teaches children to say thank you. DH’s family did the Santa brings everything, and when MIL used to stay with us at Christmas I remember her frowning as I was handing out presents from under the tree, telling DD that this was from Granny, and this was from Auntie Mary etc. I was happy to put her right on this score.

I just haven’t been able to be as frugal as usual due to covid and shopping restrictions.

And so has Santa. Job done.

I tell my kids that I have to send Santa the money which helps to manage expectations.