More Teething Trouble

It's fair to say that our tooth fairy doesn't have the best record. If she was in my employment I'd probably sack her. She is dreadfully unreliable and sometimes forgets to come on time. Sometimes she is unable to find the tooth and wakes the owner up accidentally during the search. She doesn't often communicate like other tooth fairies seem to, and when she does leave a note, her writing is 'too big' - apparently.

Eddie lost a tooth this week. Hearth mother and father had been busy doing a play while dealing with September, back to school routines, the aftermath of puppy-gate and a new member of the family (we have a teenage German exchange student staying with us).

The tooth fairy was up to her old tricks again.

'She didn't come!' cried a distraught Eddie upon waking yesterday morning.

'What do you mean?' I called, frowning at Hearth-father and fumbling frantically in my purse.

Hearth Father's palm was duly crossed and he took up the, er,  baton. 'Now then, let's see. I bet she did. Nothing there under the pillow? Are you sure? Let's look under the...mattress, just in case.'

Lo and behold: a single shiny pound coin. Magic. Sleight of hand. Disaster averted. Eddie was ecstatic. For a moment.

'But she didn't take the tooth!' he wailed.

'No-o. No, she didn't. Um...Perhaps she was disturbed in the night. Maybe you woke up too soon.'

This was followed by some hasty improvisation of fairy folklore.

'She might come back for it tonight?' He added, rather desperately. 'Perhaps that's what happens in these, um, cases...'

Thankfully, the tooth fairy had a better memory in the evening. But there were whispered discussions across the landing.

'She wouldn't just take it and leave nothing...'

'Do you think she would leave another coin?'

'Well, it has always been a two pound coin for the first big front tooth...'

'Fair enough.'

Some urgent checking of pockets and purses ensued.

'I've only got a bloody two quid coin!'

'Ssssssh. Give it here.'

'But then he'll have had three pounds!'

'Never mind. It'll have to do. So be it.'

Thus Eddie came down to breakfast in jubilant mood this morning, his trouser pockets heavy with gold; and was last overheard in the playground regaling his friends with the story of how he tricked the tooth fairy...

Currently reading: Mapp & Lucia by EF Benson

More Tooth Fairy Troubles

Eddie lost his first 'legitimate' tooth yesterday. (I don't think having one knocked out in an incident at school really counts?)

Said tooth was carefully placed in a cup for safekeeping. Said cup was then carefully washed and put away. Accidentally. 

"Never mind," said Eddie, pragmatically. "I have a plan!"

Top marks for resourcefulness. Dropped a few for spelling and punctuation.

In the midst of Goodwood Revival madness in our house this weekend, the situation got forgotten, until I remembered at about 6am this morning. I snuck in with a pound, but was unable to retrieve the correspondence. 

Eddie was confused. "I've got a pound...but the fairy hasn't taken the letter! Why not? And if they didn't take the letter, how did they know?"

"Um....I think tooth fairies just know when teeth fall out. And perhaps the letter was too...large for them to take."

Very few marks for resourcefulness. Dropped marks for forgetfulness.

No longer smashing parenting.

Currently reading: Bird by Bird by Anne Lamott

Tooth Fairy Needs to Remortgage

Gertie begins her secondary school adventure in the morning. Her clothes are laid out ready, the new blazer has its purple flash sewn on denoting her new house colours, the shoes are polished, the school bag and PE kit packed. 

But that's not the story. No, the story is that Mother Nature has picked tonight for Gertie to lose three teeth. In the space of about eight minutes. And a fourth is very wobbly and painful. Calpol required. 

So now, anxious to create a good impression tomorrow, she will in fact resemble a pirate - or a geriatric - every time she opens her mouth.

More to the point, we've had to make an emergency trip to the bank to fund the fallout.

C'est la vie.

Currently reading: Imagine Me Gone by Adam Haslett

Toothless Grin

Got the call from school. 

Not the neglectful 'you've forgotten to pick your child up' one that we sometimes get when clubs are cancelled at short notice. 

No, this time it was the 'your child's been hurt in an in incident' call. I'm not a fan of that word, 'incident'. 

The 'incident' this time was that Eddie had lost a tooth. Probably a frequent occurrence amongst Year 1 children anticipating visits from the tooth fairy. Except that the tooth in question hadn't even been wobbly. Eddie had been 'pushed into a bin' by another child (a five-year-old in reception class) and his front tooth had come out. It was his first one. He wasn't ready. It had an enormous root and I couldn't believe that something so enormous had come from such a small person.

The headteacher and other staff were mortified and apologetic. Should never have been allowed to happen. Lots of blood. The other boy has been severely sanctioned. Entirely unprovoked, etc. etc. 

(I was just pleased that it was, indeed, entirely unprovoked.)

The other tooth is also a bit wobbly, so Pirate Eddie may have to have a trip to the dentist.

Currently reading: H is for Hawk by Helen Macdonald

Adventures in Fairy Land

Gertie has just had her second visit from the tooth fairy.

Apparently, after much research (or surreptitious playground discussion), it transpires that a first tooth is very special and is worth £2, and thereafter the going rate is £1.

The first tooth came out much later than those of all Gertie's contemporaries, so the wait was long and arduous. But when it came it provoked a relentless interrogation, Jeremy Paxman style, about the minutiae of the expected visit. I came away from the conversation sweating, wondering why we ever embarked on this elaborate fiction.

First time round, the mission to place the £2 coin was aborted twice due to stirring and loss of nerve, and the tooth itself couldn't be located. Finding a tooth under a pillow in my children's room is akin to the proverbial needle in a haystack. The detailed note to the tooth fairy was removed instead, and Gertie was delighted with the money and the tooth - bonus.

This time round, Gertie decided to make a gift to the tooth fairy, sellotaping some of her doll's house furniture to a letter. A smart dining room table and chairs, no less. The tooth was eventually found, (upon a return visit) and taken this time, but now the doll's house furniture is languishing in a shoe box.

The £1 was duly spent...on sweets. I'm not sure how the 'tooth' fairy feels about that. Tell a lie (imagine!), I know exactly how she feels: down in the mouth.

For 'Transition' Read 'Chaos'

It's a 'period of transition' in our house at the moment. Is that the diplomatic expression for 'chaos'? Gertie turning three seems to have coincided with the delayed arrival of the 'terrible twos'...anyone got an explanation or a thought on that? But, in addition, the stair gates have gone up, the low-level ornaments are put away, the cot mattress lowered and the teething gel has come out.

Several things have happened simultaneously. As Gilby, at ten months, has finally recovered from a prolonged period of illnesses (very boring, no need to recap, but he now appears to be fighting fit for more than a week for the first time since January) it seems he has done all his development in one go. Suddenly, today, bottom teeth have broken through, and at the weekend he at last worked out how to crawl forwards. Fast. (The backwards shuffle was frustrating us all.) So he is off; suddenly no longer a helpless baby, but a teeth-gnashing infant who can go wherever he wants.

Usually Gilby goes down to sleep with no trouble whatsoever. (The trouble comes later in the night, but that is another story.) So I put him down to sleep a few nights ago and he didn't really seem to settle properly. There were a few mumbly-grumbly cries which gradually over a period of about ten minutes became more insistent.

Usually I would leave him; he sucks his thumb so is generally fine once he has found that. But no, this began to sound more distressed, and so I eventually went in to see what was going on. He had somehow managed to climb up and pull his entire cot canopy from its railing, and was sitting up in bed covered entirely with a white floor-length drape - giving him a ghostly profile in the semi-darkness. Very funny - and he seemed to find it so too as he watched his helpless parents collapse into fits of giggles.

I know I shouldn't laugh and it could have been dangerous, but it is just an example of how nothing is now safe, not even bedtime in his cot!

The Little Battles

Thankfully, there is no major war being waged in our house currently, but there are a number of key strategic battles being played out on a regular basis. Here is a small selection:

• The struggle for a 'dry night' for Gertie. We have taken the plunge and are nappy-less, but my goodness there is a lot of washing as a result.
  


• The crusade to get a vegetable inside her. Fruit is not a problem, but you would think it was the outbreak of World War III when I offer carrot or peas.
  


• The area surrounding the laundry basket is a military zone that requires regular patrol. Why, why why can the dirty clothes just not make it in? I know that I am not alone in this particular battle, but I am certainly 'fatigued' by it.
  


• The fight for sleep. Gilby now only wakes up once or twice a night. But he has never, ever gone through. Oh, for just one night's unbroken sleep.
  


• The daily clash over the brushing of teeth. I have tried so hard to make it fun, but Gertie is not fooled and there is an ongoing battle of wills that sometimes becomes physical!
  
  
• The nightly skirmish over what time we eat. The children eat around five, when Daddy is not even home, so we always sit down to eat later after they have gone to bed. We are lucky if it is by nine o'clock. My husband does all the cooking, and is a perfectionist, demonstrated in his fleeting appearance last Thursday on Masterchef...

This post is written in response to Josie's writing workshop this week at Sleep is for the Weak, and inspired by Vegemitevix's PS3 house invasion.

My Teenage Toddler

My toddler is displaying all the characteristics of a stroppy teenager. I can see exactly how things are going to be in a dozen years' time.

Tonight I called Gertie in to the bathroom to brush her teeth. She wouldn't come because, she moodily informed me, she was "a bit busy". She was 'a bit busy' having a tea-party in her room, but no doubt in a decade it will be the latest games console that is distracting her.

On the way home from nursery tonight she told me defiantly when I asked after Harrison (the courduroy-clad two-year-old love interest from Valentine's weekend) that he is now her 'ex-boyfriend'. Where did she even learn a concept like this?!

She won't be three until May, but at this rate I am fully expecting the first dismissive "Whatever!" when we discuss plans for the celebrations.

Seven Months

Gilby was seven months old yesterday. The time has just flown by. He can now:

• Sit unaided, and it's been a good few weeks since we had a wobble backwards
  
• Giggle, brilliantly and repeatedly at the same silly thing. Over and over and over again. I think he will be easily pleased in later life. Big sister Gertie would laugh a maximum of twice before a thing no longer amused her.
  
• Pick up little things like blueberries; though he chokes if he eats them...
  
• Look at what you are pointing out to him instead of focusing on the end of your finger!
  
• Push himself backwards but not yet crawl forwards. Oh yes, and move mysteriously to traverse long distances but only when you are not in the room to figure out how he does it.
  
• Wake up only once in the night for a feed (hooray, hooray, hooray, but when will he be able to go all night without waking up at all? His big sister had been doing it for ages by now...)
  
• Dribble as though his life depended on it (very hard gums, but no sign of a tooth yet).
  
• Make his likes and dislikes very clear. If he doesn't want that mushed up parsnip then those lips are clamped firmly shut and nothing is getting past them. Ditto for the medicine he just had to take; no wonder the ear infection took a while to clear.

I find the whole process of watching this baby growing and developing absolutely amazing. Maybe even more so as I watch it second time round. And this time I don't care if other babies are doing more or less than him at this age, in fact, I don't even notice.