Where did Santa put your gifts

[BridgetMcdonald]

In my family there is a tradition that Santa leave his presents near the window..We tell our children that it is very convenient for Santa to get the window while he is flying.

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mkv to avi converter

[Noelle]

My oldest brother is severely autistic, so the seemingly traditional "Free For All" method that is typically shown in movies (and how my parents did it when they were growing up) had to be thrown out the window because the free for all would've been overly stimulating to him and if he's not happy, nobody's happy.

Because of this, we do Christmas in stations.

• Unwrapped presents have their own tree. This is the first station we do, and is the closest to the free for all. This is a "Kid's Only!" station and was typically where the awkwardly/obviously shaped presents went. This one has kinda filtered out as we've gotten older.
• Wrapped presents also have their own tree and it's in a separate location. This is the second station that we do. Presents are unwrapped one at a time while everyone watches you and "oohs and ahhs" over what you got. This is where someone plays Santa and hands everyone their presents. We all helped put these presents under the tree on Christmas Eve, even the ones marked, "From Santa." When I mentioned it when I was younger, my parents were all, "Oh, yeah. Santa came early to drop these off. He's coming back tonight to finish, though!"
• The next is the stockings, which are located in the same area as the wrapped presents as the wrapped present tree was typically located near the fireplace. We all do our own thing here as we empty the stockings.
• And finally we have Christmas Mouse. It's typically done at the same time as the stockings. I can never remember what the actual story behind Christmas Mouse is but it was my mom's favorite when she was growing up. These were always wrapped in tissue paper tied closed with ribbon and they had no To's or From's because the CM can't write or use scissors/tape. Growing up the ribbon was one color for the boys and a different one for the girls, and it was new toothbrushes, new tubes of toothpaste, new floss, and a new hairbrush. The past couple of years it's been a small block of cheese, cheese crackers, Cheez-It's, etc. I want it to go back to the hygiene products. It was only changed because my sister's kids were spending Christmas with us and Dad was all, "I can't really mark which ones would be for the kids and which would be for the adults..." I was like, "Third color of ribbon. Surely CM has at least three different colored ribbons. Or two colors of tissue paper."

Because of how much time this took, the number of presents per person, the amount of people, "play time", etc, it always takes at least 4 hours to do presents. I like it, though. It meant that we got to really spend time with each other.

TL;DR - 2 trees & stockings and then the Christmas Mouse would bring something as well.

[ornamentmaven]

Like the Christmas mouse idea!

[JollyElfDC]

I really like that Noelle. What I really like is the fact that it gets everybody involved and it isn't over in a matter of minutes. I also really like the Christmas mouse idea. It brought back memories of a book I had when I was little called Santa Mouse. I wonder if it's still in print?

[Noelle]

I really like that Noelle. What I really like is the fact that it gets everybody involved and it isn't over in a matter of minutes. I also really like the Christmas mouse idea. It brought back memories of a book I had when I was little called Santa Mouse. I wonder if it's still in print?

Exactly. I think doing it this way really drove the "family is more important than presents" and "it's better to give than to receive" points in my head more than anything else could. I mean, when you're seven, presents are still kinda your top priority but as the years go by and you start to really notice how everyone else reacts to their presents, especially ones you've picked out, it's just that much more magical.

[DayTek]

Gifts from Santa were under the tree with the rest from the family. Smaller gifts would be placed on the tree. When my husband was a child, Santa left the presents unwrapped by the tree...I thought that was so weird to me when we met! :P But Santa likes to mix things up of course...Millions of homes and he's going to do different things just to keep it interesting

[Classic Christmas]

Under the tree, unwrapped.

[aLEKSA.]

Under the three..

[ornamentmaven]

Under the tree - wrapped

[frostythesnowman]

under the tree wrapped