Of course, Sinterklaas is a wonderfully cozy time. Spoiling your loved ones with gifts and explaining them in a poem or a surprise. All wonderful.

But after we have scrutinized Piet, I would like to talk about the Sint indoctrination.

You probably think I'm nitpicking, but it increasingly gnaws at my motherly heart that I am telling my girls a lie at such a young age.

Moreover, I strategically use Sinterklaas in my parenting method. “If you sleep nicely in your own bed, you will surely get more gifts from Sinterklaas.” As a result, my children run shivering around the corner when they spontaneously encounter Sinterklaas in the city. “That's a helper Sinterklaas,” my oldest says. “Oooh, mama, I didn't say sorry this morning,” says my youngest, who thinks that Sinterklaas is mad at her for spilling her orange juice without apologizing.

And then I realized that, no matter how fun the folk festival is, I find it quite silly how we lead our children astray. That they will eventually find out that we have been fooling them all this time. Isn't that quite a fundamental mistake in parenting? The thought that strange men know whether you pee on the potty or not, whether you have neatly put your plate in the dishwasher and straightened your blanket. I find it difficult. The idea that I will soon tell them that it was all complete nonsense and that we have been fooling them.

My father is a sailor and he thought it was ‘nonsense’ to ‘pin everything on those sweethearts’ (my brother and me). As a result, I knew about the mitre and the edge by the time I was four. This deeply saddened the neighbors who were afraid I would tell everything to their children.

But you know, I found Sinterklaas just as fun and sang just as loudly by my shoe. I actually found the gifts even more fun because I knew my dear mother had chosen them, and meeting Sinterklaas... I still found that just as exciting as before. In fact, I still do.