The Family Tooth Fairy

Every family has their own unique way of celebrating the loss of a first tooth. With a family of four I've learned a few tricks from the Tooth Fairy that has even kept my 13 year old son on his toes!

Our first venture into the land of the Tooth Fairy was with my oldest daughter. With two children, I thought about whether the tooth fairy should leave a paper dollar bill, or if change would be more appealing to the child. The decision was made that our Tooth Fairy would only leave silver coins in a combination totaling $1. For the average five or six year old, this is quite a treasure.

We went along for several years quite well until my son entered the age of visits from the Tooth Fairy. Suddenly we hit a snag, my son's first tooth fell out, but he didn't know where. Was it when he was eating pizza or playing on the playground? A visit from the Tooth Fairy was still in order.

I sat my son down and let him know that the Tooth Fairy understood these things, but he needed to draw a picture for her since he no longer had a tooth. My son had this occur several times, and each time he left a picture for the Tooth Fairy if he no longer had the tooth.

Several years later, we are continuing this with child 3 and 4 of our full household. We have had several mishaps, on more than one occasion the Tooth Fairy has had too many children on her route and has been late to our home. We have had to be creative to keep their imaginations alive.

Our son has been puzzled for several years now, at an age when he began to doubt the existence of the Tooth Fairy, she was running behind on one of her visits. My son was the last person out of our house, on his way out he carefully examined his room and the tooth before exiting the house.

A quick email before we left alerted a helpful Grandma and Grandpa who happened to have a house key to stop by and play Tooth Fairy to make the tooth exchange. To this day our son is still mystified.

A family friend made the mistake one evening while playing Tooth Fairy and left a $10 dollar bill thinking it was a $1! Needless to say, the neighborhood parents had to do some pretty creative explanations why the Tooth Fairy that visited our children paid less!

Our older children have had teeth removed for braces or just stubborn baby teeth that want to hold on! They both look forward to their visit from the Tooth Fairy.

Again, my son was singled out this last time for non-payment by the Tooth Fairy. A frazzled mom quickly came up with a plan just in time. My son is notorious for not brushing and flossing. Visiting Yahoo!, I created a new email name: ToothFairy_Oregon@yahoo.com. Flossie, the name of our fairy sent my son a personal email as well as leaving a personal (computer printed) calling card on his door knob telling him to check his email.

Flossie admonished him for not flossing, as well as his limited brushing skills. She said she would be checking over the next few days and if he showed improvement she would pick up his last tooth that had been removed by the dentist. My son was surprised, but he enjoyed the note and was tickled by the attention. He also improved his brushing and flossing!

To make your life a little easier, the following were very helpful over the years:

* Always use silver colored change such as Quarters, Nickels, or Dimes.

* Place the tooth in a plastic sandwich bag, this is easy to exchange with an identical sandwich bag that contains change.

* Have your child always place the baggie with the tooth on the edge of their bed peeking out from under their pillow. After all the Tooth Fairy has a lot of homes to visit and we should help her out so she doesn't have to search for those teeth!

* Keep a small change jar, or a baggie or two ready with the correct change.

* Encourage your child to draw a picture for the Tooth Fairy. You'll treasure these as they grow older.