I tell the child everything will be fine, have them sit down and my assistant comforts them if needed. I then ask for another volunteer.

I am also a professional santa and have seen my share of crying children. But there, there seems to be a line of demarcation. An invisible border that kids can go up to without crying but if pushed over the line will instantly start bellowing. But once back behind this invisible line, they stop. Its kind of strange. I don't understand a parent (I use this term loosely in many cases)who forces their child onto Santa lap even though they are turning blue with crying.

That happened to my son when we went to see Spiderman at the mall. He was in the midst of a "Spiderman" phase and had been looking forward all week to meeting him, but then when confronted with this huge muscled cartoon character in real life, he absolutely wigged out in terror. Of course, I wanted to encourage him to go up to Spiderman to see there was nothing to be afraid of, but the wife intervened and scooped him up in full "Mom" mode, which in retrospect was probably the best choice. Now that he's reached the age where he could handle it, he's already too cool for such interests. Ah, well.

Greg is spot on in this thread. the problem was that the routine put the kid in an akward place in front of his/her peers. I have done a fire eating routine at elementary schools and gotten standing ovations. embarrass one kid and you will have tears. Think about your routines carefully! Your rotuines may me sound intheir words but not in their delivery. Opening a fire book and screaming in front of a group of five year olds is scary. I have seen james rotuine lve serveral times and he is awesome in his prestation.