The Teeth Adventures Begin

Last smile captured with a mouth full of baby teeth!

Teeth.  They really are a mystery.  Babies spend years teething, causing many unpleasant side effects.  Then, somewhere around six years old, those same teeth start falling out with a little bit less pain and a little bit more excitement.  Then they grow in again, inevitably needing thousands of dollars of orthodontic work as they cause countless problems throughout your life, and most likely end up falling out.

We're at many different teeth stages at the moment.  Eliza has no teeth yet, so we have two years of teething to look forward to in the months ahead.  Hannah and Jack have all their teeth for now, until they get their 6 year molars.  And Lilly has started losing her teeth.  She has been dying for wiggly teeth for a year now, and this summer, she finally got her wish.  Those two little bottom teeth fell out within weeks of each other, with a tiny little pull at the end from Jim and me.  Lilly got her first visit from the tooth fairy, getting two dollar, both of which were covered in fairy dust (or glitter modge podge to be exact).  Lilly left the tooth fairy a sweet letter, asking what she did with all the teeth she gets and where she gets her money to give to children when they lose teeth.  

One tooth gone!

This was one of those times when being an oldest child has its perks.  When Lilly lost her first tooth, Jack and Hannah celebrated right along with her.  You would have thought she had won the lottery!  Lilly's face lit up in disbelief, and the other two keep asking to see her little tooth and the new gap in her mouth.  Our little social butterfly spread the news quickly, telling anyone who happened to walk by our house.  She celebrated with neighbors, texted pictures to Auntie Ells and Uncle Joef, who were here for the very wiggly stage, and couldn't wait to tell Valerie, our mail lady, who is kind enough to stop and listen to a daily update on Lilly's teeth.  When Lilly told Gigi and Papa via Skype, she had to explain multiple times to Papa that no, the Tooth Fairy wouldn't come and give him money if he pulled out Gigi's teeth and put them under his pillow.  She actually told him, with a very serious look on her face, that Tooth Fairy only comes when your teeth are ready to come out.  The second tooth was just as exciting.  Lilly's smile couldn't be cuter--that giant gap in her bottom row of teeth makes me laugh every time.

Looking more and more like a Jack O'lantern

For me, losing teeth brings memories flooding back.  When I was in Prep, which is the equivalent of Kindergarten in Australia, we had a tooth chart on the wall.  The concept was simple: every time you lost a tooth, you put up a little white rectangle on the chart.  Apparently my thirst for competition started at a young age, because I decided I wanted to "win" the tooth chart.  And win I did--I put up more rectangles than anyone else in the class.  My teacher, clearly cognizant of the fact that I still had a full mouth of baby teeth talked to Mum and Dad, suggesting they might want to talk to me about this at home.  I still remember sitting in a chair in the kitchen crying and crying because I refused to admit that I had done this.  My first lesson in lying was a hard one, all over losing teeth.  Let the Clark teeth adventure begin!  

Checking out the tooth!