Well, Jess lost her first tooth. The replacement had already grown in behind it and looked like the beginning of a second row of teeth! We put it under her pillow and I checked later and sure enough, the tooth fairy has brought her a shiny golden dollar! She was so anxious to go to bed so the tooth fairy would come. Roy. You know, the Moleinator. The guy from the Santa Clause II movie. She watches those movies like they are the guidebook to how this all works. A big part of me feels really guilty. What happens when she realizes we are LYING to her? Is she going to think that God is not real either, since you can't see Him either? Rebekah was in the car with Scott. "Santa Claus isn't real. The Devil isn't real. Neither is God." What was going on in that head of hers? She must have been thinking about it for a while. Jessica has no questions. She just believes.
So, we put some Baby Orajel on her tooth, right at the base near the gum. This idea came from my friend, who used to work as an RDAEF, or Dental Assistant with too much training to get a job. After about five minutes, she said she couldn't feel it. So, I got a tissue, held onto the tooth and pulled. I felt it pull away, but it didn't come all the way out. She let out a little cry and she saw the blood on the tissue. Scared more than in pain, though, she let me try one more time and out it came. She was amazed. A second later, she had her tongue in the little hole in the front of her mouth. You can't tell me of any kid who doesn't stick their tongue there! She was so excited. She had to call her friend (who is nine months older) and she yelled into the phone, "MY LOOSE TOOTH CAME OUT!" Her friend Melanie exclaimed, "WOW, AND YOU'RE ONLY FIVE!!" She was impressed. Jess was pleased. So then, she gets into her jammies and says good night and Scott told her not to go to bed yet. I couldn't believe what I was hearing! So, she waited about ten minutes and gave us hugs and kisses again and trotted off to bed. Where Rebekah was making too much noise and Jess was getting upset because she couldn't get to sleep. She went to our bed, but not without saying, very anxiously, "But the tooth fairy will not come if I am not in my bed!". Daddy assured her that the tooth fairy wouldn't come while we were still awake and we would put her in her own bed when we went to bed. So, she went and was asleep within a short time. That is when the tooth fairy went rushing around the house trying to find a golden coin. Probably should have located one when the tooth got loose. Dumb tooth fairy! Anyway, a golden dollar was located and placed in the box. The tooth was removed and the whole kit and caboodle finished before she was placed in her bed.
We did a little research. Apparently here are the guidelines:
1. The going rate is a dollar. Sometimes paper and sometimes coins. But the preferred tender is a $1 coin. Just depends on how many kids lose their teeth that night.
2. Nobody knows how the tooth fairy gets in the house.
3. The tooth fairy always takes the tooth with him/her.
4. It is a good idea to put the tooth in a little box to be sure that it doesn't get lost. Ours went in a ziploc bag inside of a little box. Seemed to work just fine.
We'll see how excited she is when she finds all this.
I still feel a little guilty. This being our first tooth, I think we all got through it okay. There's another one that is loose next to where this one was.
I feel old.
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3 comments:
I can't believe she is that old! Wow.
I like the new look of the blog.
It is not a lie...you are a fairie to your daughter, she just doesn't tell you. When she is older and knows for sure who the tooth fairie is, she will let you know.
When it came time for my niece to learn "the truth about Santa," I told her the story from the beginning--about Nicholas, who was a bishop of Myra, and how he did kind things for people in secret. And how, after he died, people wanted to remember how good and kind he'd been, so they started doing kind things for each other in secret and claiming that "Saint Nicholas must have done it." And how, over the years, Saint Nicholas became Santa Claus. And that "Santa Claus" is real, but not quite the way she thought--that "Santa" is really all the people who love you and want to do special secret things for you. And that now she knew how it all worked, she should pick someone to play Santa for this Christmas. Then a reminder of what Christmas was really about--celebrating the birth of Jesus Christ, who gave us the most important gift of all.
I thought it went pretty well. My own experience with learning about Santa was heartbreaking, so I thought a lot about how to deal with it before it came up.
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