Santa Claus | The Beauty Around Us

An Event Full Weekend

On Friday I finished decorating our Christmas tree.

Our Christmas Tree

On Saturday I spent 6 hours cashiering at Howe’s True Value’s annual Open House. There was a good turnout for the Open House, if the lines at the cash registers are any indication! Santa Claus even paid us a visit for a couple hours. I wanted to sit on Santa’s knee to ask for an early Spring, but I couldn’t get away from the cash register long enough to do so!

Santa Claus

As the calendar was turned over from November to December, someone turned on the snow engine. We’ve had snow every day since the beginning of December.

December 2, 2010

8:51 AM on December 5, 2010

We enjoyed the company of friends today. Sherry and Craig visited with us for a couple hours. Sherry and Craig live about 1 1/2 hours east of our home. Sherry and Craig enjoyed their drive through a winter wonderland, as they made their journey to our home. We visited for about 3 hours before Sherry and Craig left for their drive back home.

Sherry and Craig

It has been snowing all day. We have a lake effect snow warning in effect through 7:00 PM on Tuesday. The weatherman is calling for 8-12 inches of snow, with locally higher amounts possible.It will be interesting to see how high the snow piles on top of the bird feeder. This might be the highest we see the pile of snow, though, because the wind has picked up!

6:09 PM December 5, 2010

This photograph was taken approximately 9 1/4 hours later than the previous photograph of the bird feeder.

Santa and I

This photograph of Santa Claus and me is undated. Rather than just post a picture of Santa Claus and me, I decided to research the origin of the ritual of sitting on Santa Claus’s knee.

According to Wikipedia, “Santa Claus appears in the weeks before Christmas in department stores or shopping malls, or at parties. The practice of this has been credited to James Edgar, as he started doing this in 1890 in his Brockton, Massachusetts department store. He is played by an actor, usually helped by other actors (often mall employees) dressed as elves or other creatures of forklore associated with Santa. Santa’s function is either to promote the store’s image by distributing small gifts to children, or to provide a seasonal experience to children by listening to their wishlist while having them sit on his knee. Sometimes a photograph of the child and Santa are taken. Having a Santa set up to take pictures with children is a ritual that dates back at least to 1918.

The area set up for this purpose is festively decorated, usually with a large throne, and is called variously “Santa’s Grotto”, “Santa’s Workshop” or a similar term. In the United States, the most notable of these is the Santa at the flagship Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade on the last float, and his court takes over a large portion of one floor in the store. The Macy’s Santa Claus is often said to be the real Santa. Essayist David Sedaris is known for the satirical diary he kept while working as an elf in the Macy’s display, which he later published.

Quite often the Santa, if and when he is detected to be fake, says that he is not the real Santa and is helping him at this time of year. Most young children seem to understand this, as the real Santa would be extremely busy around Christmas. At family parties, Santa is sometimes impersonated by the male head of the household or other adult male family member.”