Is that the REAL Santa Claus?

First off, Maddie seems to think that it won't be Christmas until it snows. And here there are slim slim chances of that happening. She thinks that Santa needs snow in order to come. I have tried explaining to her that Santa goes to lots of places where there isn't any snow On Thursday night we went to the Festival. Maddie asked as we were walking in if Santa was going to be there. The flier had said he would so I told her yes. When we found where he was at-he was actually in a little store where you had to pay 21.95 for a sheet of pictures. We told Maddie that it would cost a lot of money to see Santa. She said that he must not be the real Santa- because he wouldn't make kids pay money to see him. I was surprised that she would pick up on something like that! So we explained that Santa is really busy this time of year and sometimes he has to get helpers. Our ward Christmas party was the next night and she was bummed when Santa wasn't there. We told her that the elves were going to make sure that Santa was at the nativity the next night. We went with Josh's brother Justin and his wife Shana and their 2 kids Jacoby and Miranda. Maddie calls them her best friend cousins. And sure enough when we made it- there was Santa! Maddie leaned over to me and asked "Mommy- is this the REAL Santa?" I told her "Yep, he knew you wanted to see him and he made sure to be here tonight." The look on her face was priceless. She was beaming. She sat on his lap and just smiled at him. When he asked her what she would like for Christmas she went blank! She had been practicing for days- and at the moment- she couldn't remember. She yelled "Mom---what did I want?" So we told Santa and he said he would do his best and Maddie said we would have cookies waiting for him when he got there. It made her night!