The holidays are quickly approaching, and little ones have begun the eager countdown to Christmas morning. A tradition in many families is to write a letter to Saint Nick, and many tech-savvy children are turning to the Internet to get their letters to Santa in on time.

A Christmas elf can e-mail Santa a wish list at http://www.northpole.com/mailroom. Unfortunately, all the snow and ice at the North Pole can wreak havoc on the Claus’ Internet connection, so it may take three days to get an e-mailed response from Santa. This website does have one pop-up that appears when you first visit the site, but it’s a generic advertisement and safe for little eyes.

Those children in the “know” can bypass the long lines and e-mail Santa and Mrs. Claus their wish list at http://www.saintnick.org/html/letters.html. It appears Mrs. Claus and Rudolph are on top of getting these letters turned around quickly, and you can expect a reply from Santa in less than half an hour.

If you would like to print out a letter from Santa to your child, visit http://www.kriskringle.com/post-office/. However, Santa will need a little help from parents because he may have trouble figuring out which printer to print to at your house. This website plays music regardless of what items you click on. You will have to close the site to stop the music.

If your children are hovering between naughty and nice, help them stay on track by visiting http://www.claus.com/naughtyornice/index.php to see where they rank on the nice-o-meter. If you are really concerned about where your children are on the list, consider cross-checking their names at the list maintained over at http://www.kriskringle.com/santas-house/. We would not want any clerical errors.

For those of you who would like to see Santa in person, but the tickets to the North Pole are just too expensive this year, Santa is more than willing to send a customized video message for free at http://magicsanta.ca/homepage.html.

Santa will need a little help to create the video, but the results are well worth it. Then watch along with your child as Santa pulls his or her name and photo card from his files. After going over a few items (such as whether or not they’ve been nice to their brothers and sisters), he sends the elves off to work on the list. Before he says goodbye, he creates a magical ornament for his Christmas tree and offers words of encouragement to your child for the new year.

If you are concerned about Santa not taking care of himself this holiday season, check out his beach vacation at http://www.santa.net/video-summer.html. Who knew Santa could surf? During his downtime, Santa likes to put his feet up and read the North Pole Times. You too can keep up with the latest happening at the North Pole by visiting http://www.northpoletimes.com/.

For the parent who wishes to get no sleep on Christmas Eve, check the Santa tracker for the exact hour and minute that Santa will be at your house at http://www.kriskringle.com/tracking-center/. He’ll be at my house at 12:43:28 a.m. on Christmas day, so if you live on my street you’d best be ready.

As always, the North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD) is on top of keeping North America’s air space free and clear for Santa to make his deliveries. They will help you track Santa’s flight path starting on Christmas Eve at http://www.noradsanta.org/.

For the traditionalists out there, it should be noted that all of the etiquette experts agree that a hand-written note is best. Handwritten letters can be mailed to North Pole, Holiday Postmark, Postmaster, 4141 Postmark Dr., Anchorage, AK 99530-9998.

If you would like to help Santa Claus out, you can write another letter addressed to your child with appropriate postage and mail it in a larger envelope to address above. The Postmaster there will send the letter from Santa to your child with the official North Pole postmark.

Be sure to check with your local post office to see if they participate in the Letters to Santa program. This holiday season take time to enjoy the wonder and excitement Christmas has to offer with the children in your life.