Visits with Santa – a Family Tradition

Back in 1985 a tradition was born.

In Portland, if you want to see the “real” Santa, you go to Santaland at Meier & Frank (now Macy’s). 

So of course when we took our first baby to see Santa, off to Santaland we went.  As a six month old Logan thought nothing of the funny, jolly old man and happily let Santa hold him for a perfect photo moment.

Well, it was a different story the next year  Our cute little 18 month old didn’t think that funny, jolly old man was too great.  Logan started screaming when we attempted to hand him to Santa so we could get a picture.

Being the smart man that he is, Santa invited mom and dad to join him.  So all three of us piled onto Santa’s lap. 

O.K. -  so no comments about the hair – it was the 80’s!

Thus, a tradition was born!  For the last 23 years the whole family -now six of us – visit the “real” Santa at what is now Macy’s.  We all pile onto Santa’s lap for the traditional family photo!

Yes, each of my children, ages 24, 22, 19 and 15 still sit on Santa’s lap and tell him what they want for Christmas.  And you know what – they love it!!  You see the rule at our house is “You don’t believe, you don’t get!”

We haven’t missed a year.  There have been years when someone has been missing in the photo - the years our boys were serving missions in Argentina and Chile and then there was the year Clark had a wrestling match (don’t start me on that one!). 

But there has been a family Santa picture for the last 23 years!  I have them all in an album if you want to see! 

Well, if you have been watching the weather at all, you may know that the Northwest is now in it’s 9th day of Arctic Blast 2008!  Yes, we currently have 10 inches of snow in our front yard and this morning all cars were being advised to only drive if you had chains.  I don’t think the City of Portland owns a snowplow! 

As a result of the weather our annual visit to Santa hadn’t happened yet. 

Well, we were running out of time – only three more days until Christmas!  I wasn’t about to let this be the first year we didn’t have a family picture with Santa. 

So, we put the chains on the car, loaded in and headed downtown.  It was no surprise but there was no line to see Santa and we got the photo!  Guess I am the only mother in Portland willing to risk her children’s lives to get a photo with Santa!!

Taking a good family photo with six people can be a challenge.  Every family has one – the one member who loves to make funny faces in pictures.  You know the one – everyone looks great in the picture except for that one person – the one in the back sticking out their tongue or making rabbit ears.  Well ours is Clark.  See what I mean!

We have just learned that you never take just one photo – you take several. 

You can imagine how we laughed when we saw this picture – Clark is the only one that looks good!! 

But thanks to a persistent photographer we got it – we got a good one. 

The one for the family album. 

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Tagged as: Christmas, Traditions, visit with Santa