Santa Did His Best

Sophie dictated a letter to Santa a few weeks back. Here it is:

Dear Santa,
My name is Sophie. And I want you to bring me a present today. Tomorrow. I want a teddy bear. My name is Sophie and I'm really good. I feed my brother. Jameson wants to get a present, too. He wants a hippopotamus. I love my momma. I love my daddy. I love my baby. I love my friends. And I love my Callie Dog. She wants a bone, like (bone-crunching sound). I would also like a flower toy and a remote control that you can push buttons and race cars. And I want a new book. Santa can choose. Love,

And then she wrote an S. And she drew her little alien versions of Sophie, Daddy, Mommy, Jameson (a dot on the page), Callie, GramKat, Granddad, Mamaw, Leroy (that's our lizard that lives outside on the porch, but on the picture he looks a lot like Mommy), Laney, Lucy, Papa, Papa Joe, and a few more S's.

I figured Santa would have no problem with the bear and the book. Easy peasy. We decided that the remote control car might be a good thing for Santa to bring next year. I had already bought a flower wreath for dress-up, so I figured that would count for a "flower toy." And to help out Santa even more, I went online and located a wooden hippopotamus for Jameson. Done.

Until the day before Christmas. I finally sat down and looked through her school folder of artwork, and found a Dear Santa letter that she had dictated to her teacher, Miss Rachel (and then she traced over about half of the letters).

Dear Santa,
I would like a teddy bear for Christmas. I also want a CD of witch songs and a toy hamster. Love, Sophie

Yee-ikes. Do you know how hard it is for Santa to find Halloweeny music at Christmas time? And the toy hamster? She is almost assuredly referring to these dancing hamsters at Laney's house that play the banjo song from Deliverance. Not exactly Toys R Us merchandise. But Santa came through on the bear request. Good ol' Santa. And I think he's checking for some ebay hamsters for Valentine's Day.