I love Christmas.

Christmas Eve is a particular favourite day of ours. For the last few years we have held a birthday party for Jesus. This started as we had young children as did all of our friends. It has become a bit of a tradition now that we all get together from about 5; the adults eat, drink and chat while the children have a birthday party.

After a while, and when we want the children to start thinking about bed, we visit NORAD on the web to find out where Santa is and how long it will be before he arrives. This gives the children an excuse to leave and go to sleep.

I know some will think the mixture of the fact of Jesus birth and the mixing of Santa imagery to not be good – ah well, they are kid and we enjoy the time!

I like this whole evening because the children love it. They are all getting too old to believe in Santa but they all like the event and still wish to believe. I am sure that when they are in their teens we will still hear ‘Aunty Sarah, Uncle Rob we’ve got to have the Jesus birthday party still!’

Events like this are important. It gives children things to remember and instills the specialness of the day which could easily be lost in a feasts of food and wrapping paper.