Fairy Dust Blues

So here's the thing. When your first kid loses his first baby tooth, it's almost as exciting for you as it is for him. It's like the last vestige of babyhood has just fallen bloodily from his mouth and it needs to be marked. And not just with a quarter under a pillow. So you make it extra special. You get gold dollars. Then to really seal the deal, you sprinkle fairy dust, aka glitter, around his pillow when you make the switch. This is a big hit. You congratulate yourself for another happy childhood memory, another bit of magic for him to believe in.

Then he loses the next tooth and you do it again. Then his brother loses a tooth and you do it again. Eventually, you're on your fifth go-around and that's where I was last night (or more accurately early this morning). At this point, there is no way I can just skip the fairy dust. It's expected. So at 1 a.m. I find myself rummaging through the bins in the craft room looking for glitter and cursint the invention of glitter glue because that simply won't work. I come up with some purple glitter and go to my secret stash of fairy coins only to discover that last time around I had helpfully stashed the silver glitter in with the coins. There's another tooth just hanging on for dear life, so this will be repeated in the next few days. Hopefully I'll remember where I put the glitter.

Meanwhile, Chas is wanting to apply his $2 (I know, $2! I got a lousy quarter when I was a kid!) to his Mama's credit card so he can buy something more expensive. Clearly he doesn't know how credit cards work. Equally clearly he has not inherited my extreme aversion to debt. Sigh.

The Tooth Fairy has been here at last!

Last night, Eddie was finally willing to part with his teeth. Or rather, with most of them. He wrote her a note asking if he could please keep just one. Being an enormous sucker, she agreed.

This morning, both boys were in bed with moms when Chas woke up and ran back to their bedroom. Eddie was still sleeping soundly. A minute later, Chas was back, the familiar sound of coinage clinking in his little hand. I asked him what he had. "Money! It was under Eddie's pillow!"

I explained that Eddie would probably like to find it for himself and instructed him to go put it back, which he did. Then he came and woke up his brother. Eddie was quite pleased to get $12 in gold coin. (Dollars, but he thinks they are pennies. And he's still thrilled. Hmm.) He also kept one of his rooty teeth AND had a note from the Fairy thanking him for his manners in asking nicely to keep a tooth and congratulating him on his excellent oral hygiene while gently suggesting that he work a bit harder at it.

There was also a sprinkling of "fairy dust" left at the site, which Chas dismissed. "Well, I see some blue glitter," he said when it was pointed out to him. Eddie didn't care -- he was busy counting his coin. And losing one already.

It's now safely in the piggy bank. Oh, and the first point of his second adult tooth is now through the gums. Steph and my sister Cathy insist that they can tell that his first adult tooth has already started moving forward now that the baby teeth are gone. But I'm dubious.

Breaking the Tooth Fairy

While we were at Sea World last month, I noticed one of Eddie's adult teeth had broken through -- behind his baby teeth. Hmm. Today, we saw the dentist.

I broke my usual insistence that he go back alone. I had questions. He had questions. Well, actually, he had question. "Will it hurt?" So I went with him. He got nitrous, but just a little because Bad Mommy didn't think to have him avoid eating anything beforehand. Oops.

Anyway, x-rays showed some serious crowding, so the dentist said he was going to have to take four. F-O-U-R teeth. I had expected 2 at the most. I was in a little shock, but I didn't let it show.
So some nitrous, a series of shots (He only whimpered during the first few, his eyes filling with tears. Mine didn't -- but only because I was concentrating so hard on staying cool and relaxed for him.) and a few hard twists of some very shiny plier-type instruments and voila! Four baby teeth on the gauze, four nasty-looking holes in Eddie's mouth.

He's sleeping now, bloody gauze clutched in his mouth. He was exceedingly brave and very sweet about it all. And he expects some serious love from La Tooth Fairy tonight.

So here are the before and afters -- with a real after to come after he wakes up. Notice that only one of the baby teeth had a dissolved root. I guess we need to start saving for the orthodontist now. Sigh.

Last smile with a full mouth of baby teeth. (Poor kid doesn't

know what's gonna hit him.) And, as promised the new, holier grin.

The not-so-fantastic four


Sleeping it off...