Fairy Fairy Quite Contrary

About 2 weeks ago Tomato told me that her bottom tooth was wobbly.  I thought that that was wishful thinking as her little friend Kayla P has just lost her bottom tooth and was showing it off to everyone at school.  Well a few days later I realized that she was actually right and there definitely was a wobbly peg that her tongue refused to leave alone.

Last night she begged me to pull it out.  While my stomach turned, I dutifully took a tissue and attempted to pry this tiny ivory from its 5½ year resting place.  Lots of groaning took place (mostly from me) but that little tooth was not budging.  Undeterred Tomato took the tissue from me and headed for the mirror while I went into negotiations with hubby over whose parental responsibility tooth-pulling should fall into.  I went with “this is a man’s job” pretty much my go-to negotiation for all grose things, like taking out the rubbish, the safe capture and relocation of spiders and the removal of dead birds.  I had actually got him to reluctantly agree (because this turns his stomach as much as it does mine) when there was an excited screech from the bathroom “BLOOD!!!!”  Ah yes, another one of those stomach-turning things a parent needs to endure without having any kind of outward negative reaction that could distress the child further, even though inside we are screaming “Noooooo, yuk!!”

I raced to the bathroom and sure enough she had managed to grab it and yank it and it was bleeding but still hanging on by a thread.  My stomach was churning and it took everything in me to keep my dinner where it belonged but there was no time to focus on my nausea because she was wild with excitement and was just waiting for me to come so that she could perform the final extraction in front of an audience.  As the good mother that I am, I encouraged her to do just that and with one quick pull it was out.

*silence* 

We both stared at the tiny tooth in her fingers and then I did the “woo hoo dance” grabbing her and getting excited and then she started to cry.  Mrs Practicality was grabbing tissues to stem the blood flow but Tomato was sobbing…… I must admit I had not seen this coming AT ALL. She had been trying to crowbar solidly-rooted teeth out of her mouth for weeks and when she finally got one out she started to cry?  I was unprepared - but not for long. Not even 10 seconds later she was smiling and laughing and…… crying again.  I think it was so emotional that she didn’t know which emotion to have so she had them all.  I gave her a big hug and gently pried the little ivory from her fist as I had visions of it falling down the drain and the mayhem that would inevitably follow, and we rushed off to show Daddy who was feeding Lettuce, and Bacon, both of whom were suitably impressed.  I could see the relief on hubby’s face that his tooth-pulling duties had been delayed and would not be commencing that night as he had feared.

When I was young younger we had a Tooth Mouse but after a bit of detective work I discovered that Tomato was desperate to have a visit from the Tooth Fairy, so I waved my magic wand and made it so.  After a quick photo op of the toothless child posing in various positions of victory, the little tooth was gently placed on her slipper and the slipper was positioned on the floor next to her bed (I must admit I did not realize that milk teeth were so tiny).  Both Bacon and Tomato fell asleep surprisingly quickly so the coast was clear for the fairy.  

Let’s go back a few days…..

A friend of mine posted on Facebook that her son’s tooth was loose and she asked “what is the fairy’s going rate for a tooth?.”  She received a plethora of replies ranging from R100 to R10 with a whole lot of digits in-between.  I remembered how Kayla P had proudly shown me the gap in her mouth and told me that the Tooth Fairy had given her R100.  I also thought back to my little mouse who could only afford 20c a tooth and wondered whether he was a church mouse.  I also remember my excitement at getting that coin in my slipper.  I then added my favorite ingredient to any situation, the key ingredient that people tend to forget, LOGIC.  Yes the reason we all had to take maths at school, to learn logic.  I flunked maths but I did indeed learn that important logic thingy.  I realized that Tomato had absolutely NO idea what R100 was and I also realized (after a quick calculation of approximately 20 teeth x R100 x 3 children x time value of money + interest) that I did not want to re-bond my house to fund the overly-generous habits of a mystical dental creature.

Back to the present......

A good parent is always prepared.  A great parent is one who was unprepared but made a darn good plan anyway.  Being great parents, hubby and I started raiding all possible coin-rich areas of the house and car and we came up with 2 x R5, 3 x R2 and 3 x R1 coins.  For those who are mathematically challenged let me help you before you whip out your calculator, that amounted to 19 South African Ront.  We decided that the first tooth should fetch R20 (from good parents) R19 (from great parents) and every tooth thereafter would get R10 or as close to that as possible.  I have fond memories of the note that the Tooth Mouse left me and I have kept it all these years, so I decided to do the same for my little girl.  Learning from my brother Dorothy, whose freakishly bright daughter recognized the mouse’s handwriting, I wrote a note, being careful to use my non-ambidextrous left hand!!  I then cut the note out in the shape of a tooth and I was A for away.  

*Note to wanna-be-copycat parents, don’t use coloured paper for added excitement as nobody wants a green/ blue/ pink tooth.

I then put on my Tooth Fairy costume *wink wink* and proceeded to Tomato’s bedroom to get the special slipper.  Panic!  She had dropped her blanket onto the slipper and I couldn’t find the slipper let alone the miniature tooth!  I had visions of them finding the tooth a week later and many many questions being asked.  Groping around the carpet in the dark under Tomato’s bed I eventually found the slipper and the tooth.  Undetected I quietly removed them both from the room.  I arranged the coins nicely in the slipper and tried out various positions for the note and then it suddenly struck me – what on earth was I supposed to do with the tooth??  Eeewwww!!!  This was not covered in the many parenting classes that weren’t offered.  Quick – I’ll ask my Facebook friends, there’s bound to be a night owl like me still awake.  As luck would have it, the same friend whose son has a loose tooth responded with “keep it in her Memory Box?”  Uh.... ok that’s a great idea, I need to start a Memory Box right now!!  (Don’t judge me, you know that your memory box is just a bunch of papers and memorabilia that you haven’t gotten round to putting in chronological order yet).  I gently wrapped up the little tooth in a tissue, put it into a pretty little tin that was handy and deposited said tin in a very high-up spot in my cupboard, promising myself for the 100^th time in the past almost 6 years of Tomato’s life that I would sort out her Memory Box.  I hoped that I would do this before I began mixing up teeth by adding in Bacon and Lettuce’s teeth as they fall out into the same box - oops!   I then sneaked into her room and left the loot.

 

The next morning I could hear the shrieks of excitement through the bedroom wall as the slipper was discovered.  Tomato came rushing into our room for me to read the “tooth-note.”  She was soo excited that there had been a real fairy in her room and she got her own EIGHT COINS!!!   She insisted on telling everybody she met that day and she is still telling people she hadn’t yet seen that she got EIGHT COINS!!! 

She has a few money boxes that she plays with and uses our loose coppers whenever she can find them.  Now she has since made herself a money box out of the round Melrose Cheese box.  She cut a slot to put her coins in and taped the sides closed for added security.  I suddenly realized that sometimes we as adults are over-thinkers.  Our small children don’t know the value that we place on things and I had to smile when she came to me later that day and confided to me that she was glad that the fairy didn’t leave her “a paper money."  When I asked her why she said "Because it’s boring.”  I gently tried to explain to her that you can buy more things with paper money but she didn’t care, she just said “But Mommy you can’t post paper money!!”
Touche Tomato, touche.

Post Script - 27 Feb 2013
Tooth number 3 has just been yanked out, much to the delight of Tomato!  Amazing how the blood from that is thrilling but any other blood is a catastrophe!!  When she woke up this morning the Tooth Fairy had left R10 in the shape of a heart.  Who knew Miss Fairy could do money origami!! 

Legend - BLT refers to my children:
Bacon	- 3½ years
Lettuce	- ½ year
Tomato	- 5½ years
Still confused? – see my first Blog Post