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Not only that, after blasting some scrooge on Freerepublic the other day, I remembered something that helped firm my decision up about Santa or no Santa. It was something said to me in a way I had never thought of before.
The reason most kids don't come away thinking their parents are *liars* of the worse order for pretending there is a Santa. As parents when we play Santa, we give without any expectation of recognition on our parts, sometimes for the first time in our lives. "Santa" gets all the credit. As kids realize who "Santa" really is, perhaps they don't outwardly express that as a learned lesson, but the fact that the tradition continues means some kind of lesson and joy for giving gifts anonymously is had by people. I wish I had time to explain it better.

My 5 yr old still believes in Santa. She's smart as a whip and I know at some point, I expect before she hits 7 or 8, she is going to figure it out. I can tell already by how she is that she won't hate her dad and I for doing it. If anything she will be positively giddy to help with the younger kids and I know she'll still get some joy in finding presents under the tree for herself from "Santa";-)
Someone who ends up with a sullen and hateful child when they find out there is no Santa has some deeper issues to wrangle with and should have that child seen by a psychologist imo.

You are so completely right about Santa. When I went running to Mom with tears in my eyes she explained that well maybe Santa was not a real person but a special spirit of the season. That spirit was that we love others, be thankful for our bounty and help those who were not as fortunate as us. (We were really poor back then but I didn't know it!)

She explained how much fun it was to think about what I was going to give the other family members and last but not least, if Santa was not real, how did all those presents get there? I was a happy camper!