before i forget...

tysen was 'playing' in the living room...he said, "mom! let's pray". i said "sure, go ahead honey".....tysen said, "mom, you have to close your eyes!". i had my hands in something messy that i couldn't immediately put down, so i told him i couldn't stop right this second, but to go ahead and pray. (he was pretending anyway)....so he begins...
"dear Jesus, thank you for dis day....etc etc...and a mommy be disobedient...amen"

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tysen and ian were in the car with me.
ian - "mom, do you know what is under the ground?"

me - "um, dirt?"

ian - "no, like underneath the dirt"

unsure of where he was going with this, i said, "no, what?"

ian (very sure of himself) - "lava. yep, that's where hell is and there is lava everywhere. that's where people go if they don't believe in Jesus. (he then turns to tysen) hey tysen - did you know that if you believe in Jesus, you go up in the sky to heaven? do you believe in Jesus, ty-ty?"

tysen doesn't even look up from the toy thats in his hand and says "n-nope".

ian gasps (obviously appalled) and said, "tysen! but if you don't believe in Jesus, you will have to go to hell!!"

tysen (still unmoved and hasn't even looked up yet) - "ok. i go down into da lava..."

ian leans back in his seat and crosses his arms, giving up - "fine, but i'm gonna be heaven"

tysen snaps his head up with a big smile - "i'm just kidding. i believe in Jesus."

ian was thrilled! he turned to him so happy and said, "you do? then we'll both be in heaven!"

:)
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so, we've never made a big deal about santa...never encouraged or discouraged. but the boys have picked up stuff at school, and they believed in him. andy and i had agreed that it was fine, and we would just always make sure to enforce the real reason for christmas, but to allow them some fun with santa. well, neither of us were prepared for logan's curiosity last night.

as we were headed to bed, logan said, "dad, do you believe in santa?"
but we hadn't discussed yet how we wanted to answer that question.

so, andy sat him down and tried our "line" with him again, "well, santa is something we do that's fun, but christmas is really all about Jesus".....logan looked him right in the eyes and said, "so that's a no?" andy about fell over.

so he continued and said, "no, i don't believe in santa" he continued on to try and explain that we can still have fun with santa, but he's pretend. logan then pressed on and asked who puts presents in their stockings.... so andy told him that mommy and daddy do that. logan looked really conflicted, and that broke my heart. i wanted him to have the freedom to believe until he was ready, and he didn't appear ready as he seemed like he really wanted to believe. (i didn't like having to keep a secret when i was a kid about santa being pretend, and i didn't want that for him)

he went on to bed, and i cried...(andy had thought he would be consoling his kids when they found out about santa....little did he know, he would be consoling his wife)...i was just so sad for logan because he looked so disappointed...and christmas is only 3 days away....
so, andy and i talked some more....we agreed that it was ok for him to be honest with logan, but also allow logan the freedom to 'believe' if he wanted to. (i felt like logan was partially disappointed because he still wanted to believe, but would have been worried about letting his dad down) so, andy went into to logan's room and said, "hey buddy, i want you to know its ok if you want to believe in santa..." i'm pretty sure logan didn't care as much as i did...but it made me feel better that logan knew he had our "approval".

of course he hasn't mentioned it this morning, so i guess we're already over it.