I got a great email today that I wanted to share and discuss!
Amy,
I just wondered your thoughts on this article and what you do in your house. I read one time about someone who gave their child foreign currency instead so there was no ‘value’ to compare with the other kids. It also allowed the parent to teach some world geography and expose the child to new cultures.
Thanks for all you do. I love the blogs.
New mommy to be (May 08),
Katie
The tooth fairy hasn’t visited our home yet, although my son is quickly approaching that age! I am excited to learn from all of you and share on this topic!! Much thanks to Katie for this idea, as I think it is so great to talk about.
What are the tooth fairy economics in your house?
The tooth fairy hasn’t visited this house yet, but someone bought my son a tooth pillow with a tiny tooth-keeping pocket in it.
When the big day comes for the fairy to visit, she will bring $1 just like I got as a kid and he can trek over to the dollar store to pick something out.
Little kids are aware of no inflation, so I think $1 still works!
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While a 5 year old may enjoy getting a foreign coin, he is going to quickly realize that while he has been given a collectible by the tooth fairy–his friends have been given (by the same tooth fairy!) something they can spend at the store!
Its a perfect opportunity to teach your child to have a grateful heart for what he’s been given, and to teach him good money habits. If the “tooth fairy” is going to deliver something other than spendable money, at least make it a toy or something that will have some sort of value for your child.
Just .02 cents from someone who hopes to be a mother one day!
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At our House, the tooth Fairy left Gold Dollar Coins.
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We leave a dollar when we remember, sometimes a gold dollar which my kids get really excited about.
And sometimes we forget and that’s when the “tooth fairy leaves change all over the house for them to find”. Thank goodness for my husband’s sloppy change habits.
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We had a hard time with this, because my son had to have 4 teeth pulled at once(the first ones he “lost). (He has a very small mouth and 4 permanents will take the space of 6 baby teeth. So we had to make room) It was awful! We gave him $5 for 4 teeth, and a TON of sympathy. (I had originally thought $.25 per tooth, but how could I after they’d been pulled and most were whole?) May none of you have to go through that.
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My daughter is only 2 so I didn’t have to deal with this yet, but I remember that I used to get $5 a tooth plus sugarless gum (trident)==to promote proper dental hygiene. I love the creativity of the foreign currency but i do think that will get old fast.
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I’m not exactly sure where we came up with the amounts but the tooth fairy at our house gives $4 for the first tooth and $2 for every tooth after that.
I like the Gold dollar Coin idea though and may be rethinking our strategy with our littlest!
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Well, not wanting to feed the greed monster, I opted to have the tooth fairy leave small gifts (ie, from the dollar store or the dollar bins at Target) in exchange for teeth. In retrospect, I would probably just do $1/tooth. They’re not greedy for tooth fairy MONEY now… but they’re greedy for the STUFF, so it really didn’t do any good. lol PLUS, it has the added drawback of requiring me to be READY with a small toy whenever the tooth happens to fall out. heh Sometimes the tooth fairy’s car is in the shop and it takes her a couple days to get here.
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Here’s something to definitely remember when it comes to the Tooth Fairy…if you want to give $1, or $5 or whatever,make sure you have the bill(s) set aside somewhere for when the tooth does come out. My daughter decided to get out of bed to pull out her first loose tooth at about 10:45 pm (we had company in from out of town) and not a single adult in the house had anything less than a $20! So the tooth fairy had to write a very long detailed note about how this was a VERY special occassion because she BRAVELY pulled out that tooth, and that this would NEVER happen again!
Ever since, we all learned our lessons and I keep some cash stashed somewhere so I’m not caught without what I need again!
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We do about a dollar.
But most of the time I forget and then the kids complain the next morning. They figured out at about 5 that there was no such thing as the tooth fairy. There was only the tooth Daddy. But the tooth Daddy forgets a lot.
So now they just raid our wallets. But at least they’re honest about it
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Visit To Love, Honor and Vacuum today!
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@ Maggie: My husband and I were just thinking about the gold dollar coins, too. They’re common enough but look like more fun. A big, shiny, golden coin and at a dollar a tooth, it’s not too shabby for parent or kid.
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When my kids were younger, I use to put four quarters under their pillow. They used to think that having four quarters was more than having one dollar bill. I will admit, that I too have forgotten to leave them money under their pillow. When they would get up in the morning upset that the tooth fairy had forgotten them, I would slip into their rooms and put the money inside their pillow cases. Then when they would make their beds, the money would jingle or fall out of the pillow case and we would make a big deal about how the tooth fairy hadn’t forgotten about them, she just put the money inside the pillow case.
Jodi
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I like to leave $2 bills, 1 per tooth. Since they are rare, the kids are more inclined to save them. You can still get them at the bank.
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We gave my daughter $1 per lost tooth until we moved to a new neighborhood. Apparently, in this neighborhood, teeth rate more and she wanted to know why the Tooth Fairy wasn’t bringing her $2 like her friends got. Nothing like a little Tooth Fairy inflation to drive up the price of teeth. She now gets $2.
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