Wednesday, March 25, 2009

Tooth Fairy Blues

I love being a mom, and I love traditions and holidays, I just wish some traditions were more compatible with the demands of motherhood, i.e. the tooth fairy. It's 7 o' clock at night, ben was out of town, Avery and Weston were sick and Eden comes running in to my room excited because she finally lost her tooth. She starts going on and on about the tooth fairy coming and what she'll leave for her. My mind begins to race trying to remember if I had any cash in my wallet, any in Ben's drawer, any change in the car-no, no, and no. I start in on the couch cushions when I begin contemplating ruining Eden's childhood and spoil the magic of the tooth fairy and tell her the cold, hard truth. Then I remember that Britta has some money in a jar in the laundry room...crisis averted.

NOT EVEN A WEEK LATER!!!!!

Eden lost her top tooth and again was extremely excited, and I thought to myself, well at least this time I know I have a dollar in my purse, whoo! So the day goes by, evening, kids in bed, I lay down to read a book and was so tired,fell asleep. Next thing I know, it's 6:45 am, and I hear Eden in tears talking to Ben while he's getting ready for work telling him the tooth fairy didn't come. SHOOT!!!!! Granted I was up a few times through out the night with Weston, and I should have remembered then, but I was only awake by the most technical sense of the word. Ben and I tried to smooth out the situation and told her we were sure the tooth fairy would come that night. All day, I kept reminding myself to put the dollar from my purse under her pillow. Well, I leave for a meeting, come home, go to my wallet to get out the dollar and it's not there!!! Oh that's right, I had to use it to donate to Eden's class for a book fair! So Ben goes to the store, 10 at night, to get her her favorite candy bar and it puts it under pillow. All is well.

Now, I know the easy and responsible solution would be keeping extra money on hand, but that would involve an extra errand to the bank or actually remembering to get cash back at the grocery store while I'm shepherding three kids past the candy section, loading grcoeries in the cart and telling Weston, "It's okay, we're almost done, hang in there buddy." Why oh why didn't the person who created the tooth fairy have a clause built in to make it easier on parents: "The tooth fairy will come within 1-3 days from the time the tooth came out."

5 comments:

Momma said...

I'm with you girl. After too many disappointing nights, I just gave up and told you all the tooth fairy wasn't real. Truly I think it's a cruel joke made up by some stinky kids who just wanted to find a situation no one could predict to make their parents feel bad. That's my theory anyway-I'm not bitter.

katie said...

That story is hilarious! I wish I had a tooth to lose so I could get a candy bar...

the letter "J" said...

Our tooth fairy is full of all sorts of excuses...you left your door closed and she couldn't get in...she got stuck in the snow storm...she was so busy she ran out of time...it goes on and on. Lorenzo has lost 8 teeth and I think she got it on the first night ONCE!! :o) It builds character!

Melanie said...

Welcome to the wonderful world of letting your children down. You're new, we've been here for a bit! In times past when we've forgotten to be the tooth fairy and are then awoken by the sound of cries from the other room, one of us helps the child look all around for the money, while the other parent slips the dollar behind the bed. When given the thumbs up signal, the parent searching with the distressed child then stumbles across the dollar. "Hey! Look! It just fell behind the bed is all!" Works like a charm. Yeah, we know we're pathetic.

Elisa said...

Great post!