Brunch with Santa

Today the Woman's Club of Joppatowne held their annual Brunch with Santa in our library. Children ages 3 to second grade must either have read 6 books or have 6 books read to them to qualify for a free ticket to this brunch. The library handles all the advertisement and the exchange of reading logs for tickets.

The Woman's Club sets up the tables in the meeting room and decorates the place. They supply everything, including the food and womanpower to run the event. Plus,they find a Santa. It's my job to provide the entertainment. I have three or four standard programs that I like to alternate:


1) Santa books and songs -- especially Douglas Wood's What Santa Can't Do.




2) The Night Before Christmas program -- with a special appearance of Maynard Moose's little sister moose, who tells Willy Claflin's famous story, The Night Before Chrissmoose.



3) The 12 Days of Christmas program -- the kids help me sing the song and I use various books, crazy or serious, that feature the song.

At each of these three programs, I show off some of my Robert Sabuda cut paper Christmas books, many of which are available for check out at our library.

4) Today, I presented a new program -- all about Christmas Trees. I used a book with photos of a Christmas Tree farm, Eve Bunting's Night Tree, and Bear's Christmas Star by Mireille D'Allancé. The children helped me tell a flannel board version of The Tree That Stayed up All Year. I couldn't find a tree-related Robert Sabuda book, so I shared his Christmas Alphabet. (Hint, Hint -- RO-bert. Please do a Christmas Tree pop-up book.)

After donuts and juice, Santa arrived to talk to each child, have a photo opp, and hand out presents. As the relatives took pictures of the children (mostly with their cell phones), one mother wondered why all Santas told the kids that, Oh yes they'd get the gifts they asked him about. In between the two programs, our volunteer Santa heard about this. He decided to try to rephrase his responses at the Noon event -- and he did.
-wendieO