"You know Santa is not real."

Yep, those were her words to her 5 year old cousin. I missed the whole scene, but was filled in on all the details. It appears that one of the princesses distance cousins was commenting on the need to go home and make cookies for Santa. My super smart, never lacking for words daughter decided that this was the moment to inform her that Santa was not real. Now I was told by the adults who witnessed this conversation that the words went right over the young ins head, but the young ins Mama heard it and she was hot. She didn't waste anytime in finding me and alerting me to the fact that my daughter said Santa was FAKE!!

I'll have to admit my first response was to want to laugh, but I knew that I was dealing with a pretty sensitive person and my Mom was watching so I decided to do the adult thing and say, "I'm sorry, but that is what she has learned." To which she made some comment about ME controlling what she says. I honestly was at a loss for words. She obviously didn't know the princess very well and her copious vocabulary and how I have NO control over those words. And then to top it off she took her daughter and left!!

I will admit that we had some laughs about this event, but it started me thinking about the whole Santa thing. We never set out to teach the princess that Santa was all a story, but she asked me, "Is Santa real?" And at that point I had to make a split second decision and it wasn't that hard to decide that I wasn't going to lie to my child. I want my daughter to trust me without hesitation. And I know how her logical brain works. She will deduce that if I withhold the truth on Santa than what is to keep me to withholding the truth on something else. And I refuse to create a fantasy for her just so she doesn't pop somebody elses bubble. No, I don't want her to bust somebodies bubble, but I want to TRUTH to be the TRUTH.

We have lots of discussions about whose real and whose not? Is Cinderella real? Is the Tooth Fairy real? Is Jesus real? Above anything else I don't want her to lump Jesus into the same category of Santa. For that reason I'll take the risk that she is going to tell some poor little kid that Santa is FAKE!