Santa Trauma

In an attempt to avoid the long lines at the mall, this year we arranged a "private meeting" with Santa Claus himself at my friend Kasey's house. I dressed the kids, packed my camera, and hoped for the perfect ho-ho-ho-photo of smiling children sitting on the lap of Santa. I even had the scrapbook page all planned out in my head. It was going to be absolute magic!

Magic . . . until Brendan actually saw Santa Clause.

His perfect ho-ho-ho-scrapbookable-smile turned into this . . .

This is his totally-terrified-but-not-too-terrified-to-stop-eating-this-cookie smile.

It reminds me of when Megan sat on Santa's lap when she was about his age.

Let's take a walk down memory lane here . . .

Megan 2007

And now back to good old, terrifying 2010.

Megan didn't seem too happy about sitting on Santa's lap either. I think she forced herself, afraid of what he might bring if she didn't give him her detailed list.

She was very business-like and described exactly what she was hoping for this year.

Maybe one of these year's I'll get a scrapbookable photo of my kids on Santa's lap, but I doubt it.