Do you let the kids check if father Christmas has been?

[PumpkinHat]

Hello, sorry for the very boring thread!

This year is the first year that my 2 DC (3&2) will have an understanding of what Christmas is about, father Christmas etc - so I really want to start making some traditions now to carry on.

One thing that's going through my mind is the whole stocking and present under the tree thing. They have got stockings which preferably get opened in the bedroom(?), which is what I did as a child. However, they will know santa has been with the stocking there. Part of me wants them to wake up and then we go and "check" to see if santa has been with all the presents under the tree. But then what happens about stockings? Will they want to open them knowing all that is under the tree waiting for them?

I know this sounds really trivial and I do apologise, I just want to make my DC's Christmas really special - and I know you are all Christmas experts!

FC brings the stockings only, which are left down by the fireplace. We go downstairs to see if he's been.

Presents under the tree are from family, so no confusion

Oh and we don't open tree presents until after the Queens speech. No issues with waiting either, it's just what we do

He only ever brought relatively little stocking things in this family - 3 generations of that. So I remember crawling down to the end of the bed in the middle of the night to feel the bulging stocking - he’d been! Such excitement! But there was no opening allowed until a reasonably civilised hour.

Presents under the tree were from parents/other family, and were only opened once we were up and dressed.

DC run down to see what Santa has left under the tree.
Mum and Dad's joint gifts have been wrapped prior and handed to them after the excitement has died down.
Love the moment.

We have the stockings above the fireplace. In the morning, we all get up and everyone gets washed and changed then we all gather by the living room door with a countdown from 5. All presents are opened and the tags kept. We write down the gift received on the relevant tag so the thank you notes can be written on boxing day.
The stockings are kept until after Christmas dinner, when everyone is gathered together to watch a film.

Might add that I have very fond memories of both excited dds bringing their stockings to open on our bed - along with dog and cat, who were interested to see what was going on. Just as well we always had a nice big bed....
Then dh and I would open our stockings - everybody in our house always gets one - it’s the law here. 🎅🏻

Stocking from FC in room but he brings it through to our room to open . All other gifts from family etc under tree and we open after we finish lunch - normally done after 530ish - DS happy to wait - I think it's the anticipation of the presents and knowing we will open later on . As I'm nearest tree usually ( and have bought and wrapped 90% of them

I hand them out - tending to keep DS big gift til near the end - works for us

One Santa present in the bedroom which the children all bring to us in the morning, luckily he leaves the grown ups one too!

Then breakfast. Then a quick peak in the lounge where all the presents and stockings are. I leave the Christmas lights on all night on Christmas Eve. Then off to church and for a walk. Then home for the grand present opening.

Each child takes one present in turn from their pile and everyone watches (and I frantically scribble it down so we can write thank you cards later). Then after that's finished the grown ups unwrap the tree presents. We also hide a couple of presents for the children under the tree so they don't get bored and these are from us rather than Father Christmas.

Can't wait!!

Stockings left downstairs and then on DCs beds when they wake up (I remember the magic of feeling the weight of the stocking on my bed and knowing he'd been!) they bring them into our room to open while we grab an extra 10 minutes in bed. One big present left downstairs from FC. Rest of presents under tree from family and are opened throughout the day.

It will be special OP Christmas you are entering the golden period of Christmas magic with DC, have a lovely time.

Stockings downstairs here as I’d heard horror stories of waking children up when putting them in the bedroom!
It’s much less stressful

Stockings left outside bedroom doors and can be opened at whatever time they wake up. Rest of presents are in the living room. The children are not allowed in there until everyone dressed, breakfasted, cleared up and turkey in the oven. Then they are allowed in to open the rest of the presents. I love taking a photo/video of them as they walk into the living room and see the presents.

Oh its been so lovely reading everyone's traditions, im so excited to be starting on that journey .

Just to clarify, I forgot to mention that stockings are from father Christmas and also 2 tree presents which are wrapped in a different paper. The rest of the tree presents are from real people.

I think we will probably have stockings opened in the bedroom and then ill whiz in the front room to turn tree lights on/make sure the dog hasn't made a mess etc before letting them come and see. We've actually got tiny sacks this year instead of actual stockings because I thought it would be easier for little hands getting presents out, and they would look lovely in front of the tree but I'm worried that the blooming dog will have the chocolate coins inside!

Again its been so lovely reading everyone's traditions, its making me feel very christmassy! I'm very excited for Christmas for the first time in a long time.

We’ve always done stockings downstairs. It started because when my oldest child (now 12) was little, he was scared of the idea of a strange being in the house and coming into his room (understandable!) so he asked if FC could come down the chimney, fill the stockings, then go! (This was after I’d already said no to him leaving the presents at the end of the road!)

So that’s what we’ve always done. And the lovely thing is that we still run downstairs together (he has two little sisters now too!) to check if FC has been and then open the pressies together.

FC only does stockings in our house. Tree presents are from us and family.

We have stockings in their bedroom which are opened upstairs in our bed. We then all go downstairs together and see if he has left them a present under the tree, they get one present from santa.We have no restraint so presents are usually all opened be about 7am!

I've done both stockings upstairs and downstairs.
As a child I was terrified of the thought of FC roaming around my house dead at night so I refused to let my DM leave stockings in my bedroom so our stockings were hung on a wall downstairs above our santa sacks. Our DF would go down and check if SC have been and we'd be left bouncing full of excitement on the top step waiting for DF to reappear on the bottom step to tell us it was okay to come down. I have such fond memories of that.
I have my own DC now and I leave stockings upstairs. I really like the idea of DC waking up to feel the weight of filled stockings on the end of their bed. Me and DP make up a stocking for eachother too so we all sit in bed together opening stockings. Even though they've had their stockings I still carry on the tradition of checking FC had been by going downstairs to check and it still has its desired effect on the DC and they're just as excited as I was!

Stockings were always downstairs when we were DCs (and also in DH's house), and we do the same here.

When we were DCs, each DC had either a single armchair, the pouffe, or a single cushion on the couch/sofa (big family) - each DC put the biggest pair of socks (or tights as girls grew cleverer!!) on the seat they had chosen (or been assigned on failure!) on evening of 24th, and they were filled with fruit, and other presents piled around them on that seat were for that DC.

As DD is alone, she just puts her stocking in the middle of the floor.

So the "checking" is done once DD wakes and has come for a snuggle and woken us up....even as a teen she still does this (and leaves out a stocking!! ).

Santa leaves a small present in the bedroom (a book usually) so they know he's been, without needing to go downstairs. They aren't allowed downstairs without us, so the books serve a dual purpose of meaning they aren't waking us up at 4am to insist we check he's been, and gives them something quiet to do which means we don't get woken so early. In theory anyway.

Forgot to say, the kids can see the front die from the top of the stairs, so Santa leaves a glittery shoe print on the welcome mat too.

I enjoy the squeal of excitement as they spot it

My children have a stocking which is for Father Christmas presents. Everything under the tree is from family. The stocking isn't kept in their bedrooms as my dd didn't like the thought of Father Christmas coming into her bedroom whilst she was asleep, so we put the stockings out downstairs before they go to bed and then there is the surprise in the morning when we go into the living room of whether or not FC has been. It also makes filling the stockings easier when I can do it in the living room once they've gone to bed rather than trying to sneak around their bedroom doing it as silently as possible.

We have stockings on their beds which they open in our bed, that’s the most exciting bit. They’ve never needed to see all the other presents for the excitement.

The presents downstairs are from us.

Stockings are hung from fireplace here as DS gets worried every year about Santa being in the house so our rule is Santa doesnt go upstairs, just living room and straight out.
All presents that we buy and stocking are from us. Everything else is given by whoever it's from when they see them. Ds is 10 and 8 so too late to change now but i wish i had done stocking and 1 gift from santa just from the beginning

We didn't do stockings. If I had my time again I would do stockings from FC and presents from us. However, we didn't. So all presents (apart from family ones) were from FC and went into sacks. They put their sacks out in front of the fire on christmas eve and we all went down in the morning to see if he had been....with them opening the door first. The kids aged 4 and 2 was the most magical Christmas morning I have ever experienced with the absolute wonder from them. After that they became wild wildebeasts for a few years. Now they are teenagers 16 and 14 and for the first year ever they are not going to put their sacks out. The presents are all under the tree this year :-(

We always had stockings at the end of our beds so that's what i do. They hang them in the living room at night (less chance of waking if you only have to go in the room once) so will check when they wake up that it's now at the bottom of their beds. They come through and open in my bed to give me 5 minutes to wake up then we go through to see if/ what else he's left.

I always knew he had been because my stocking was on my bed!

We used to bring stockings downstairs and open them in the living room all together (adults get stockings too in our house) while my parents and grandparents had a cup of coffee. Then we would have breakfast and walk the dog, and after breakfast we’d open our big presents from Father Christmas. All of the family presents weren’t opened until after lunch, and we still do that now. Even when my sister and I stopped having FC presents (when we were about 10) we still opened all presents except stockings after lunch. It makes the present opening last much longer!