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karatechrissy
member
"Karma1969: If baking someone a birthday pie/cake is romantic, I must be a slut."
First year SS won't wake up here on Christmas
karatechrissy
member
So, the past 3 years, SS has always woken up here at Christmas. The first year DH and I were together we weren't living together so I didn't give this a second thought, nor was I at all responsible for the 'santa' thing. SS was also only 2 at the time and didn't 'get it'. The past 3 Christmas' we've had SS wake up here on Christmas morning. Just happened that way regardless if it was 'our' Christmas holiday. (We have pickups for holidays around 10AM). So we have always done Santa for him. This year, I realize he will not be waking up here. We have Christmas Day as 'our' holiday, but it is BM's normal day, and Christmas Eve is also BM's normal day and her holiday. So he will sleep there, wake up there, then we will pick him up at 10.
My question is, does Santa visit here for SS? I see both sides and I'm having a hard time with it. On the one hand, he will wake up at BM's, and Santa will have been there (I'm assuming... I know BM's mom will make sure Santa was there even if BM drops the ball. BM's mom doesn't let stuff like this go. She is ALL over this kind of thing). Then at our house, the kids will wake up, and DD is very into Santa this year. She understands that he will be bringing her a gift, and I always do the santa gifts unwrapped (It's the big gift so it's always a bicycle or a kitchen set kinda thing, you know?). So she will wake up that morning, and have unwrapped stuff under the tree. We will not open gifts before we get SS, but DS and DD wake up around 6:30 every day. We don't get SS till 10. There is no way to just keep the both of them upstairs and pretend like Christmas isn't here till we get SS. BUT I don't want SS to feel left out if she gets to play with the santa gift first (In all fairness, DS and DD are both getting tricycles from Santa, SS got a bicycle last year from Santa). I jsut don't want SS to feel hurt or left out at all, BUT he is already getting a santa gift. As they get older, I don't want him to expect Santa at both houses, and then DS and DD think they are getting ripped off because Santa goes to both of his houses. KWIM? I haven't approached this with DH yet (I am sure it hasn't even crossed his mind, while I've been contemplating for weeks WTF we are going to do about it). I don't think he will care either way, he lets me do my thing when it comes to this stuff, which can be good and bad at the same time, and an entirely different post all together. lol.
So, do you think I'll be dubbed evil step mom of the year if Santa doesn't bring SS a gift here this year? My other dilemma is that I am STUMPED what to even get SS this year. He is an odd child in that he doesn't LIKE toys. I gave him the big Toys R Us book that came in the mail and he circled all the stuff he already has and doesn't even touch! He circled video game stuff and ipod and ipad (which we already told him we will NOT be buying him an expensive electronic. He got an iPod last year ((I was opposed to it but DH just had to. I don't think an iPod should be given to a then 5 year old but he didn't listen)) and he ended up losing it somewhere in this house less than 2 months later). I got him some outdoor sports stuff, some where's Waldo books, an electric toothbrush (He actually asked for that lol), and a few other small things that are angry birds related but nothing big. My H doesn't know what else to get him, and I'm ready to call it a day. I have spent about $100 total on him so far, and to be honest, he still has crap in his closet in unopened boxes from his BIRTHDAY last March. I hate spending money (that we really don't have) on things that I don't think he's going to actually play with. We encourage him to open the stuff and he just says 'no I'm doing X, Y, Z right now'. Am I terrible? Suggestions? Advice?
In comparison, I have spent more money on DD this year than either DS or SS. I got her a leapfrog explorer2 when it came out on sale way earlier this year. I'm talking I bought it in August. I got her a big girl bike because she has been asking every time we pass that section in Target, and she is 2 1/2 now and needs one. I am going to get her toddler bedding and turn her crib into the daybed option, and I bought her a pair of PUma's for super super cheap($16!) about 6 months ago and guessed at the size she would be in for Christmas time. Other than a few small stocking stuffers and legos, that's all I have gotten her. DS I got a bicycle as well, a few books, and some cars. He loves cars. SS has 'more' stuff, but I spent more on DD. Does that make sense? Juggling this is really stressing me out...
DS doesn't count really. He is 18 months old and doesn't get it. I just want him to be able to rip some stuff open.
Sorry, this came out longer than I had anticipated... :-/
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"Karma1969: If baking someone a birthday pie/cake is romantic, I must be a slut."
This discussion has been closed.
Re: First year SS won't wake up here on Christmas
Yes, Santa needs to come to your house.
You mentioned a lot of electronic stuff. What about Legos, play doh, more age appropriate kid stuff?
You've mentioned BM with the quads and guns. When does he just behave like a six year old?
That's the thing. He has been exposed to all this 'big kid' stuff so early, that he honestly does not play with just toys! It is very sad. He always wants an ipod in his hand or playing with someones phone. We have drastically changed the way things are done here to try and balance it out. I can't remember the last time he touched a video game here (Not because we banned it or anything, we are just always trying to keep busy with things). He watches his fair share of tv, but we also have 2 toddlers and they really do play all.day.long. together. SS plays with their toys more than his own! DD will have something, might even be her little girl purse, and before you know it, I see SS walking around with it. I'm like dude, you're 6! lol. He is a very good big brother and really loves playing with his brother and sister, and he is actually very fair being 6. He shares great and usually will 'give up' on something just to make them happy. He has play doh, doesn't ever want to use it. I will even get it out as a group activity, he will sit for all of 5 minutes, then get up and go do something else. He is just uninterested. I literally went through the whole toys r us book and all he wanted was exact nerf stuff he already has, or video games for his wii at BM's. I told him I wasn't buying him wii games, and he can ask his mom for them if he wants them. Maybe I'll get him a ramp for his bike (he has one, but maybe a different style) from Santa. I got him stilts, I think they are pretty cool... He loves his pogo stick so I thought he might like the stilts. They adjust to 6 different heights so they are pretty safe. I just didn't know what to do about Santa really. I see it becoming a problem later when DD and DS realize that he will have a santa gift at 2 houses, and how is that fair? If he wakes up here, I totally 100% agree Santa should have left him something, I"m just having a hard time with thinking that if he isn't waking up here and he gets santa there.... kwim?
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"Karma1969: If baking someone a birthday pie/cake is romantic, I must be a slut."
Santa comes to our house every year for all the kids regardless. (ETA: we also don't see the kids actually on Christmas every year because our exchange day is the 26th). He does one big gift and stockings.
Outdoor sports equipment (basketball hoop, soccer goal, something along those lines depending on his interests), board games you can play with him? I know you said he had a bike but what about a scooter or something along those lines (our kids have both).
My youngest SS gets a big Lego set for Christmas almost every year because that's what he wants. Actually, all 4 of our big kids asked for Legos or Megablocks this year (yes, even the girls).
You're not going to make things fair in a BF situation. Yes, SS might get two vacations a year, two birthday cakes, etc., but do you really want to compare the pros and cons between having to shuffle between two houses and getting an extra Santa gift or two? C'mon. That's just wrong.
Since you said he does like to play with the kid stuff your two LOs have, I would still go the more simple route. You could even get something like Magna-tiles and have it be a gift to all three of them that they will play with all three of them together.
I also would not have Christmas morning until SS is home. Your LOs won't know whether it's Dec 25 or 26, and it is important that you celebrate as a WHOLE family.
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"Karma1969: If baking someone a birthday pie/cake is romantic, I must be a slut."
This is just one more reason I'm happy not to do Santa!
Obviously you do though, so I will try to be helpful
. I would think Santa would bring SS a present at your house too. It's not like the toys get shared between the houses, so he won't be bringing his Santa present over to your house and throwing in your kids' faces that he got two Santa presents. As your kids get older, they may ask why SS gets two presents, or they may not even realize/care. Cross that hurdle when you get to it (although it's probably just as simple as "SS has two families and two houses, so he gets two Santa presents.) As far as when to "see" the Santa presents, why not just cover the Santa presents up with a sheet so the kids can't see them until SS gets there? Maybe do something else that's big/fun first, like decorate cookies or have a big present and then pick up SS and do presents. Just a thought.
Also, if you open gifts with SS then he needs a Santa gift.
SS opens his as soon as he wakes up at bms and your kids open theirs as soon as they wake up.
When SS comes over give him the gifts you already bought him from you. Maybe wrap one and tell him Santa left it!!
This is how we do it, but DH contributes to the Santa gifts at BMs.
This is how we handle it as well. Santa only comes to our house when we have the kids overnight. However, this works for us because if its not our year for Christmas, we don't do any Christmas gifts until my kids get back from DC's the following week. I don't know if BM does Santa on our years, but we can't control what happens over there. I know my sister handles Santa the same way with my niece.
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Santa left presents for me at my house and my grandparents' house and I definitely didn't question extra presents!
Our Santa gifts have always been wrapped.
Phantom, that's really admirable. I can't see contributing to gifts I don't get to see them open, but that's really selfless of your DH.
First of all, if Santa is coming to your house for your kids, Santa comes to your house for your SS too. Now Santa doesn't have to be fair and equal in your house. I have spent years stressing over this same exact thing. First it started with BM constantly getting the SKs things that were way above them developmentally. A dart board for a 4 year old? A cell phone for an 8 year old (8 years ago)? When the SKs have laptops, cell phones, ipods, all of the latest game consoles with the newest games the day they came out, (none of which they actually use) it was really hard to try to compete, so I quit. Right now, I look at what they actually do while they are at our house and go with that. SD likes to cook, she got cookbooks, she likes to have movie nights, she got movies with snacks, etc. It made it much easier to shop when I thought about what they would probably like as opposed to what they should like. My suggestion for you would be maybe board games. Your DD should be getting into them right now, it's great quality family time.
Anyhow, after DD1 was born, I was faced with trying to make everything equal. Stressed the crap out of myself for a few years. Then last year, I felt DD was old enough to really understand the concept of wake up, open presents and of course it was the year we didn't get the SKs until noon. More stress. What I ended up doing was letting DD have a few of her gifts when she and DD2 both woke up. She wanted to play with some of them right away so we let her. She couldn't read yet so she didn't realize that she had more presents coming. Then when the SKs got here, she opened the rest of her Santa gifts, and everything that DH and I, and the other kids got her. The SKs opened their stuff, all was well. My SKs are older but if they had complained about DD getting to open some presents and play without them, I would have asked them if they got to open presents when they woke up in the morning.
This year, DH is debating on whether he wants to give BM Christmas morning so I'm not sure what is going to happen. DD1 is at an age though where she understands that SD has 2 houses, 2 Christmas', etc so opening presents on Christmas day won't be an issue regardless (and DD2 just won't care). If we end up getting SD at lunchtime, I will probably just have DDs wait to open some of their stuff. I will have them help me prepare lunch or something if I feel they need entertained while they wait.
You are not going to make things equal. Unless you are going to look at SS and say 'oh well you got Christmas at your moms so you already got Christmas, my kids are getting their Christmas here', it's never going to happen. What I have done though is get SD less than I get DDs. I figure this is DDs only home, they are SAH kiddos, and I generally try to only buy things like bedding sets, new socks, etc at Christmas time. Thus in addition to the things they want, they also get things they need. SD on the other hand spends most of her time at her moms house and actually prefers to bring all of her clothes, etc here from there. She has a few things on her list that she wants this year and I got most of them plus a few things that I think she will like. I'm not shopping for her as if she needs stuff though so she ended up with less things for less money than either of the little girls. I did spend quite a few years buying like she lived here full time and we also ended up with a lot of not taken out of the package stuff.
Sorry that this got long and rambly. The good news is though that you are stressing over something that is not going to really be that important. In a few years your kiddos will realize that SS has a life outside of your home and even if they don't understand it completely, it at least will make things a little easier to deal with.
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"Karma1969: If baking someone a birthday pie/cake is romantic, I must be a slut."
I didn't read all of your post. I don't know what all you said but I'm really not sure where you are confused. Yes you need to get SS a gift and he will open it when he gets to your house. Where's the confusion?
Chrissy, what about getting him an e-reader? I know it's a big gift, but it's in the same vein as the ipad/ipod electronics he's asking for and at least it's sometihng he could use to learn and expand his mind. And they have e-books now for all ages.
I don't know what kind of budget you're working with, but just a thought. My SD has one (and I thought my ILs were CRAZY when they purchased it for her, but she really loves it and has taken better care of it than I thought she would).
After BM had her daughter 3 years ago we decided that the house that the children wake up at is the house that Santa comes to. We decided this b/c the house they're at for Christmas day (beginning at 10:30pm on Chirstmas eve) is the house they're at until at least the 28th or 29th as well. By the time the kids got back to the other house it's 4-5 days later and to have Santa gifts for the 3 of them but not your LO's wasn't going to work for us. BM and I also both didn't want our LO's wondering why Santa goes to 2 houses for C,A & B but not for them.
So this year the kids will be with me and DH. Santa will come to our house for them but not BM's. When the kids go back to BM's on the 29th the presents they'll get will be from BM and SF. Then next year Santa will go to BM's house for them but will come to our house only for our LO. When the kids come over for our half of their break, we'll open up presents that are from DH and myself for both the skids and our LO.
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