Earlier this month, we had the honour of publishing several letters to Santa from students at the local elementary schools.
And as someone who hasn’t written a letter to Santa in many years, and doesn’t have children of her own or have any younger siblings, let me tell you it was quite a hoot to read through them.
While majority of the letters are your basic, cute, respectful letter to Santa, inquiring about his life, Mrs. Claus, and the reindeer and elves before politely asking for a gift or two, some kids just go all out and it’s fantastic.
One of my personal favourite letters from this year’s group starts out with, “Dear Santa, I have tons of questions.” Another girl asks for a unicorn, as well as a Lego set.
It’s the little things like that, that just make those letters to Santa so very special because they’re overflowing with childhood innocence and curiosity. They genuinely want to know how Santa and Mrs. Claus are doing, and if the reindeer and elves are doing alright — especially during COVID-19.
(And honestly the status of the elves is a very good question to ask, as we have no insight into their working conditions, especially around the holiday season. For those who haven’t heard “Elf’s Lament” by the Barenaked Ladies, I highly suggest giving it a listen.)
That’s one of the things that I love about the holiday season, especially when you have young children around or in your family, is seeing their rampant curiosity about how Santa does what he does and how things in the North Pole work.
Obviously we, as regular adults who don’t live at the North Pole, don’t know the exact answers to all these, so it’s helpful getting a visit to Santa at the local mall or wherever he’s visiting that day to get their questions answered right from the source.
I also love seeing all the different Santa and Christmas related traditions families have that kids carry with them into their later years.
For family Christmases with my Dad’s side of the family when my cousins and I were younger, we used to have a visit from ‘Santa Bear’, who was a teddy bear Santa, with his teddy bear elf on a teddy bear-sized sleigh with a bunch of presents.
It was a fun, cute way to keep the kids busy and have some surprises, and even though it got to a point where we all knew that it wasn’t the real Santa dropping off Santa Bear — because he was much too busy — it was still adorable and hey, what kid is going to turn down more presents?
That being said, please enjoy the letters you get to read in this week’s Northern Sentinel. They are full of curiosity, innocence, and many fantastic questions and statements.
And a final word of comfort to the kids out there: just because your letters were brought here does NOT mean they won’t get to Santa! Santa reads the Northern Sentinel and has assured me that the teachers who brought them in to me made sure to make copies that were sent to the North Pole.
clare.rayment@northernsentinel.com
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