1 in 3 British children stop believing in Santa by the age of 6 research has revealed and many of these kids pretend to still believe it to stop their parents feeling sad but also to ensure they still get the right presents.
She said: “Children want to grow up so desperately, and we as parents often provide them with the technological means or with the knowledge and stimulus to do so.
“But we should consider doing so wisely. Childhood doesn’t last forever, so it should be cherished for as long as possible before it slips away forever into adolescence adulthood.”
A crazy majority (96%) were happy to tell porkies if it meant keeping “Christmas alive” for as long as possible.
30 Christmas Moments That’ll Give Every Brit Flashbacks
It’s the most wonderful time of the year…. right?
Wrong. It was – of course – way better when we were back at Primary School: not a single care in the world, singing your tone-deaf heart out to Away in a manger and spending weeks on end writing Christmas cards to every individual person in the school (including the b*tch of a dinner lady who used to stand you out, admittedly for purposely bumping heads with your mate to get into first aid – and out of the cold – at lunch time. Still a b*tch though).
Ah yes, we all welcome the flashbacks to the days of tinsel in your hair, no worries about buying gifts for every member of the family and truly believing the big man was actually real (he ate the cookies and drank the milk we left out on Christmas Eve, of course he was real…?).
Sadly, the magic of Christmas has been slowly but surely drowned by the mundane reality of adult life…work 9-5, bills to pay and a stupid amount of presents to buy (often for people you cannot stand – yes, I’m referring to you Aunt Babs). But, for a moment, we can re-live the easier days and ride the wave of nostalgia as the festive period falls upon us once again.
Think of this like the ultimate trip down memory lane (without the SATS and the detentions)…
1. Getting all your Christmas cards ready
The first one you wrote was always to the boy or the girl you fancied… and the never ending question burned your brain every year: do you brave it and put a kiss on the end of it or not? Risky talk.
The real question: write in silver or gold gel pen?
Wow, we really had some struggles when we were younger, didn’t we? Nothing was worse than this… well, maybe deciding which gel pens you were willing to swap with your mates was quite a struggle (obv we never traded the smelly ones).
2. Then dropping them off in something like this…
In the corridor there was the infamous letterbox. Made out of recycled cardboard and crusty red paint, this was the little glimmer of hopes and dreams that went round every Christmas (the hopes being the person you fancied had posted your card in here – with a kiss on the end, obv).
Straight to the North Pole…
Remember strutting down the corridor and posting your 30 Christmas cards with the ultimate sass? We all used to buzz off the fact we had all ours written before December even hit…we even used our special gel pens! Strictly metallics only.
3. Reaching year 6 and being asked to sort out and deliver the cards to each classroom
Naturally, with great age comes great responsibility… and by that we mean you’re finally trusted with more responsibility than making the drinks for everyone in after school club. Yes, year six was definitely our time to shine and show the teachers what we were really about.
Year 6 Christmas elf…
As well as being able to sit on benches in assemblies, year six students were also the ones trusted with sorting out all the cards and, essentially, being the school elves. Every single 11 year old student absolutely loved this kind of responsibility.
4. The announcement that you were going to start rehearsals for the nativity
An iconic moment for any British kid out there: the minute you’re told that rehearsals for the nativity start first thing tomorrow morning *hold the screams and begging the teacher to be more than just a background star or tree*.
Time to shine…
Running home to tell your parents the news was magical… except you didn’t realise they were probably fuming with the fact they for they had to muster up a costume for you. No doubt it would have been made out of recycled costumes from your older siblings…
5. The ‘Christmas Dinner’ at lunch
If the dinner ladies didn’t already pull out all the stops year round – their festive dinners were definitely something to get excited about. That’s right… we got to sit down with our besties and have a Christmas dinner to end all Christmas dinners.
Mmmm, watery gravy…
Honestly, what could be more filling than lumpy mash, dry turkey and force feeding yourself vegetables? Oh, of course, the miserable mince pie you got at the end (like fruit in pastry can even be classed as a dessert anyway).
6. And deciding who you were going to pull your Christmas cracker with
The one saving grace of your Christmas dinner was the fact you got a cracker to pull. Filled to the brim with a joke, a Christmas hat that you sported for the rest of your meal and a weird piece of plastic fashioned as a game. Delightful.
That snake of a mate who always tried it on with your fella…
At the time we denied it, but everyone used to hold it as close to the middle as possible to heighten the chances of winning. We were all cheats back in Primary school (especially during every game of heads down, thumbs up).
7. PRAYING for it to snow so you could have a day off
Absolutely horrendous weather was the norm for the gloomy month of December, but that didn’t stop us praying every five seconds for it to snow enough for the headmaster to close the entire school for the day (or enough to break the school boiler).
SNOOOOOOOOW DAY
Yes, it was probably hell on earth for our parents – the thought of missing a day of work to entertain kids fuelled up on that Christmas buzz. But this was pure bliss for us tots. No school? Get the sledges out!
8. Or so you could play out in it on your break time
If it started snowing when you were at school, it usually went one of two ways: you got to play outside in it for break time or you got left behind to sit depressed in after school club because your parents couldn’t make it home in time.
Never wanting anything more than a flake of snow to fall during school hours…
If you had a nice headmaster, then you were allowed to get your scarf, gloves and wooly hat on and make the most of the snow. Alternatively, you were shunned to the classroom and forced to get the crayons out, whilst cruelly watching the snow fall from inside the classroom. Torture at its finest.
9. Thinking you were swearing when you said the word ‘Faggot’ in The Pogues – Fairytale of New York
‘You scumbag, you maggot, you cheap lousy … *stares directly at parents like the sass queens you were* … faggot’. In our defence, we had permission to say it because it was on the radio – the logic of a seven year-old diva.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HwHyuraau4Q
Still a banger…
All jokes aside, this has to be – hands down – one of the best Christmas songs out there (with All I Want For Christmas falling directly behind). Over the festive period, we will hear this song a good 1,000 times and not one of us are complaining about it…
10. Playing the infamous role of a Shepherd and whacking your mum’s tea towel over your head
Question: What do you get when you cross a tatty, overused, ripped tea towel from your kitchen with an old, manky bedsheet that’s not seen daylight for 5 years?
Answer: An extremely well thought out shepherd costume for the nativity play… duhhhh.
Hoping your mam washed the tea-towel…
Everyone knows the drill: if you were shepherd, you were blessed with the easiest costume out there (mums loved this). Also, you probably only had to learn one line in the whole nativity, whilst still retaining an integral role. A.K.A: the perfect casting for a lazy child.
11. Remember the stage blocks for the nativity being set up in the hall?
Wasn’t this the best thing to see? This meant your Hollywood-worthy performance was merely days away. The teachers spent their time after school setting up the hall for the award-winning spectacle, that all parents were no doubt going to record on their huge camcorders (remember those beauties…?).
One d*ckhead always fell off this stage…
This was the true symbol for ‘school’s out for Christmas’… lessons stopped being so damn hard, teachers stopped caring as much and we couldn’t focus on anything but the mountains of presents we were expecting to open on Christmas morning!
12. The Christmas fair
It goes without saying that the Christmas fair at school was easily one of the highlights of the festive period. An afternoon splashing all your hard earned pocket money like there was no tomorrow, as well as eating your own body weight in sweets and stocking up on all the reindeer dusted needed to guide Santa to your gaff on Christmas Eve? Yes please.
Parents, teachers, kids and a hall full of crap…
Prepping for the Christmas fair was another story – somehow we felt no stress, but the teachers and parents definitely went through weeks of hell to make sure the whole event ran smoothly. We never really appreciated the effort that teachers used to go to tbh, shame on us.
13. Going all out and wearing tinsel in your hair for the last week of school
Us girls absolutely loved to experiment with hair accessories back in the day: headbands, clips, hair glitter – the lot! But, when Christmas came around we were willing to push the festive boat out …as far out as it could possibly go.
Poundland pulling it out the bag…
Yes, admit it, at one point we were all those annoying girls who had to force our parents to buy some tinsel from Poundland so we could strut about school with it in our hair. It wasn’t the classiest look, but we didn’t care.
14. The Christmas disco
This meant one thing: getting off your tits on sweets. I’m pretty sure the teachers mentoring could think of a list of a thousand things they’d wanna do before looking after a bunch of kids – high on sweets – getting every move to the Cha Cha Slide wrong.
Cha-cha slide…
When you reached year five and six, you finally grew enough dutch courage (thanks to the strawberry laces and rip-off Coca Cola) to ask the person you fancied to dance. And by dance… we mean skid across the floor to your favourite Now 56 bangers.
15. The good teachers letting you have a mini Christmas party in the classroom
Typically, this Christmas party consisted of getting a sausage roll and a bun served to you on a paper plate, whilst listening to the best x-mas songs out there. What better way to get you in the festive spirit?!
Party rings and chocolate yule log…
Also, you probably spent the whole afternoon doing a Christmas quiz and overloading on sugar – a disaster for parents who then got sent home with hyper AF kids. Sorry to mum and dad for the endless years of annoying evenings…still cute though.
16. Being allowed to wear your favourite pair of Ugg boots because of the snow
It was an absolute god send when we were sent home with the infamous letter discussing how uniforms were allowed to be changed if the weather became more extreme. This letter was recycled every single year and we waited with bated breath for its appearance each year.
Wave ta-ra to your Kickers…
To parents and teachers, this was purely for our own welfare. But to us, this was a chance to let our creative fashion sense SHINE! By shine, we mean whipping out the Ugg boots and treating the school corridors like a catwalk.
17. The teachers making every single lesson Christmas themed
If you were a teacher – you’d 100% do the same. Without a doubt, you can imagine that lesson prepping would be a whole lot more fun when you can turn everything Christmassy! Also, there’s definitely an abundance of x-mas related worksheets available online… saving time every day.
‘Independent learning’ they called it…
Us kids never complained when we were dished out with a worksheet with a picture of an Elf on the bottom. Something this small used to make lessons way more fun… as well as reminding us that the big day was merely a few weeks away!
18. Doing the display boards in the hall
Whoever had to plan what to do for the display boards in the hall needed a medal. Trying to make 30 pictures – drawn by artistically-challenged kids – look half decent must have been a task and a half. They always had to have a special meaning behind them too…
Cotton wool snowmen…
Somehow, we ended up doing the same kind of thing for the Christmas displays each year. We weren’t complaining though, because it meant art lesson after art lesson! They also all featured cotton wool balls… cheap yet effective.
19. Arts and crafts… literally 24/7
You could tell that teachers lost all interest in their teaching by the start of the second week in December. So, what better way to blag teaching than to bring out all the stops: paper, tons of glitter and glue.
Glitter and PVA glue…the dream duo
Teachers quickly learnt that glue was a bad idea, considering we coated our hands in it and waited to peel it off…But, the key ingredient to any Christmas arts and crafts was definitely cotton wool balls. It made the perfect snow for any image we were trying to create…
20. Making snowflakes out of pieces of paper
Without a doubt, this was the most b-tech crafts activity that you could do, but this doesn’t mean it wasn’t bundles of fun. Folding up your piece of paper and cutting it up to make a snowflake – simple but effective.
Classroom decorations sorted…
The only downfall was the mountains of mess that you had to clean up afterwards – the pieces of paper got everywhere! Teachers probably hated us doing this due to the mess alone, but we have to admit we made some pretty spectacular snowflakes.
21. Making something to take home for your mum or dad
This wasn’t something that we were asked to do every single year, but at some point throughout our primary school career we had to sit down and make something for either one of our parents – all in the sprit of Christmas.
Pasta, paper plates and PVA glue…
A pasta necklace, a card saturated in glitter or even a painting… either way, this was getting pinned up on the fridge for the rest of your teens and shown off to your mum’s mates (no matter how sh*t it was).
22. Tights becoming a strict part of your wardrobe
The deeper into to December we get each year, the colder it gets. When we were at school, the girls had to wear skirts – the only way to stop frostbite? Layer up with thick wooly tights.
Do they do these in our size?
A pair of tights and thick socks was a regular combo for any school day, wasn’t it? There were even some people who doubled up and wore two pairs of tights at once. Either way, it was always thick, wooly grey tights that would make an appearance around this time of year. So comfy.
23. Operation Christmas…wrapping up a shoe box with paper and filling it with presents
This was the one thing that made you feel really good about Christmas back in the day. You would all get encouraged to wrap up a shoe box and fill it to the brim with little gifts – that you would often take for granted!
Feeling like Picasso when your box was crowned the best decorated shoebox…
Everyone in your class would create their own box and it would then get sent to children who were more in need of these little gifts. An amazing idea when you think about it…can we still do this?!
24. When your teachers couldn’t be ar*ed so you just watched a Christmas film
If your teachers were weeks deep into their festivities, then chances were that they couldn’t be bothered teaching you anything relevant – you’d definitely forget it come the New Year anyway! Therefore, anything you needed to learn could definitely wait until after x-mas.
Was always the Grinch…
Amazingly, every teacher had this mindset. This of course meant that a few afternoons a week we were allowed to sit and watch a film, truly getting ourselves in that Christmas spirit. Wow… primary school was so much easier than this adult-thing.
25. Going to an old people’s home to sing to them…
At the time we were only thinking about the half day of school we were missing – but on reflection, doing something like this was actually adorable. We would prepare a few songs and make our way over to a local home.
…and hand out homemade, bespoke, crap presents.
We were all awful at singing, but that didn’t stop us getting excited about the fact we got to leave school grounds and have an afternoon off school. This usually resulted in an early finish as well… result!
26. The infamous donkey outfit…
Well… what can we say about this outfit? The school genuinely invested their money into getting a two-man donkey outfit, which made a return every single year for the nativity. Potentially the most famous role for nativities across the nation.
Anyone seen Anthony?!
Unless you’ve been living under a rock, you will know that it took two people to make this outfit work. The naughtiest boys in the class were always the ones that got put in this, for one reason only: out of sight, out of mind.
27. Singing Christmas songs from the projector every assembly
Every single aspect of your Primary School life got injected with that Christmas vibe. So, why would assembly be any different? We had to sing some of the best Christmas songs out there, whilst reading the lyrics off the projector.
Being project manager…
Who remembers being singled out in front of everyone at the start of assembly and selected to be in charge of the projector? There was actually no bigger honour throughout your childhood years… everyone wanted to play with you at break time if you did this – way to score popularity points.
28. Ending the nativity with ‘We Wish You A Merry Christmas’
As if the Christmas nativity wasn’t already lit enough, it always ended with the whole of the cast singing ‘We Wish You A Merry Christmas’… and the parents got heavily involved as well. This song was ingrained into our memories.
What a banger…
This song alone symbolised the end of the year and confirmed we were not up for doing any work for the rest of the week. Everyone already knew the words to this – you’d sing it every year without fail.
29. Christmas card competition
This happened every single year without fail and all the primary schools in your area entered a Christmas card competition – that was usually (harshly) judged by the town’s mayor… as if they didn’t have more important jobs to be doing.
When you got the cotton balls out for this, sh*t was about to get real…
They’d pick a winner from each school… does anyone know where the cards actually went? You’d win something well boring like Waterstones’ or WHSmith’s vouchers worth up to about a tenner. But, despite the crap prize, that didn’t stop us putting our all into these cards.
30. The last day…
The last day can only be described as absolute chaos and mayhem. Kids running about like there’s no tomorrow and teachers mentally shutting down after a term of madness. Absolute carnage… but we wouldn’t have had it any other way.
‘See you next year…’ – banterrrrrr
The run-up to Christmas at primary school had to be the best few weeks of our lives. If only the festive season was as exciting to us adults. Maybe we should start living life like Primary school kids again…tinsel bobble anyone?
