There are moments in parenting that are just plain fun. Moments like the first time your kid projectile pees on your husband. Or instead of eating their first birthday cake, they simply slam their head down directly into it. Ya know, stuff like that.
And then there’s their first tooth.
For weeks you watch them wiggle it, run away when you try to touch it, push their tongue repeatedly against it, and ask you over and over again, “When is it going to fall out?”
And then, after contemplating getting a pair of pliers when they are sleeping and just pulling it out yourself, you hear the words you have been waiting for. The words that make your heart sing.
“MOMMY!!! I JUST PULLED OUT MY TOOTH!!!”
And you dance a huge dance of joy. And you scream loudly with glee. And then you brace yourself for what is going to happen next.
“OH MY GOD, I’M BLEEDING!!!”
It never crossed my mind to maybe explain that when you lose a tooth, there… uhm… might be some blood. Whoops. Parenting fail #7,658.
But after the gauze, the crying, the laughing, back to crying, and then amazement – there is happiness. Pure and utter happiness.
And you, as a parent, have now entered a new world. A world without governing rules or universal agreement. A world called “The Land of the Tooth Fairy.”
Do you give $1 or $5? Do you get a dollar coin or give a bill? Do you leave a note or does she leave one back? Do I sprinkle fairy dust on her pillow and leave the window open?
You hear all these ideas – all these extravagant ways to celebrate the death and rotting of a tooth the size of a peanut.
So in the end, we settled on $2. No glitter. No fairy dust. No window left open like a creepy stalker. Just $2.
And oh yeah, the damn tooth in a ball of wax. Because for some reason, my girl wanted to keep it. Which, might just be creepier than a miniature fairy sneaking into your room to take dead teeth.
