Tooth Fairy Traditions

We’ve been losing a lot of baby teeth in our house. Six within the last 8 months to be exact and the subject of wiggly teeth often dominate the conversation. I wish I could attribute it to Halloween candy consumption but I’m pretty sure that my little kiddos are growing up. Ugh. When our oldest lost her first tooth we had to scramble. She had heard about the tooth fairy at school and had questions. It quickly brought to head how we were going to celebrate the tooth fairy in our house. I’m big on Santa Claus and magical childhood traditions so it wasn’t a question of if we were going to but rather how. Read on for my TAKE on the Tooth Fairy and the traditions we decided upon in our home.

We wanted to make a decision about the tooth fairy and the traditions surrounding losing a tooth that could be consistent and easily attainable for all of our children. $20 a tooth or even $5 a tooth isn’t something we wanted to set a precedent with but we did want to make the experience exciting and memorable. As per usual, I did a quick Google and Etsy search and found lots of fun ideas; most memorably ones that involved lots of glitter and teeny tiny foot prints. (Um, no thanks. Too much mess.) There were other ideas about leaving little baskets of goodies too but in the end we decided on some really simple and classic traditions: a tooth pillow, leaving a coin or bill, a note and for the first tooth a Maileg tooth fairy mouse.

I like to think we elevate these classic traditions by leaving a silver dollar and $2 bill (thankfully my husband had the foresight to order these in bulk from the bank) and leaving notes in teeny tiny penmanship. The notes are quite fun as they often require a magnifying glass to read! Tiptoeing into our kids room while they sleep to capture the tooth is such a rush and afterwards I store each tooth in a quaint little box. I’m not sure what I will do with the teeth, if anything but it doesn’t feel right to part with them.

If you’re children are into reading about the Tooth Fairy and the loss of a tooth Little Rabbit’s Loose Tooth was one of my favorites growing up, I still remember her tooth in the bowl of chocolate ice cream so vividly. My oldest is especially into imagining that she can capture the tooth fairy so we frequently read, How to Catch the Tooth Fairy. Whatever your traditions may be it’s just fun to celebrate this time in their lives and don’t forget to take photos of your toothless wonders!

Tooth Fairy Tradition Essentials

• Oeuf Tooth Pillow

• Maileg Mouse Tooth Fairy

• Kate Spade Tooth Box (no longer available but found something similar)

• How to Catch the Tooth Fairy

• Tooth Fairy’s Night

• Magnifying Glass

Yes Day!

This past weekend we had our first annual “Yes Day” and by all accounts it was a success! I discovered the “Yes Day” concept by chance a year ago. 

Last Valentine's Day there was a widely circulated essay about Modern Love called, You May Want to Marry My Husband published in the New York Times. The touching essay was written by Amy Krouse Rosenthal, a Chicago resident and children's book author who at the time was battling terminal cancer. Unfortunately, Amy passed away last March but I was to say the least, intrigued by her story. As an avid consumer and lover of children's books I had to check out what she had written. 

After a trusty Google search or two I discovered that Amy had written dozens of books; even books that I was quite fond of such as Little Pea and Uni the Unicorn. There were however, plenty of new ones to discover including a book called, Yes Day!  authored by Amy and Tom Lichtenheld. I quickly ordered Yes Day! a genius book about a day in which once a year a little boy gets to ask his parents for exactly what he wants and they can't say NO! I mean this concept is so simple yet so creative - it’s genius! What kid doesn’t want to feel like they have some control over their parents? Once the book arrived I stashed it in the closet waiting for an appropriate time to introduce it to our kids.

After a few months I started to think that our oldest two children would dig a “Yes Day”. They had been battling cabin fever due to illness and frigid temps and most days we keep them on a strict schedule. Our 3 year old is at the point, where he frequently asks, "Daddy, why do you always say No, No No? Why don't you say Yes, Yes, Yes? Yikes! To be fair most of the time we say NO to keep our energetic son from injuring himself but his point has been taken. Loud and clear. We need to slow down and have some fun! This past weekend I knew was going to be relatively unscheduled so on Thursday night I warned my husband about Saturday's plans and on Friday night I introduced the book. After reading the book, I asked our kids if they would like a “Yes Day” to which they eagerly answered YES and from then on you could just see the ideas spinning in their heads.

So what you ask, did our kids ask to do on “Yes Day”? Well, they both woke up at 6am eager to get started...read below for a sampling of our day.

• Can we watch the iPads?  YES
• Can we watch the iPads for an hour? YES
• Can we have pancakes for breakfast? YES 
• Can the pancakes have chocolate chips in them? YES
• Can I pick out my own clothes? (Very important to our daughter) YES
• Can we build a fort? YES
• Can we keep the fort up? YES
• Can we pick up our toys later? YES
• Can we have lollipops? YES
• Can we go to the park in our old neighborhood? (It was freezing) YES
• Can I have cantalopue and ketchup for lunch? YES
• Can we have smoothies at Whole Foods? YES
• Can we play video games in the arcade? YES
• Can you paint my finger nails? YES
• Can we play a board game? YES
• Can we make banana bread? YES
• Can we take the El train to get ice cream before dinner? YES
• Can we watch a movie while eating dinner? YES
• Can we stay up late? YES
• Can I sleep in my sleeping bag? YES

I will be the first to admit that “Yes Day” is fun but exhausting! Our kids have endless amounts of energy however, I’m grateful that for our first “Yes Day” they came up with a very attainable wish list. For the most part their desires revolved around sugary treats and not cleaning up. In a few years I can imagine that their ideas will become much more elaborate. One thing that I didn’t expect was how challenging it was going to be to not say NO! I really made a conscious effort to do this , rather I thought more about the words I used especially if they wanted to do conflicting things. I fear I use the word NO far too often - I sometimes wield it like a weapon (to protect my sanity). But the more I think about it from a child’s perspective  being a grown up is like having a “Yes Day” every day. I can for the most part say YES to whatever I want besides all of those adult responsibilities but my children won’t grasp that concept for years. 

In the end the kids had a wonderful day, we started a new tradition and my husband and I albeit, sleepy gained some insight. The word NO is an extremely powerful word and children don’t yet understand the reasons behind the usage. It was almost freeing to say YES to them and if we use the word NO a little less often and give our children the option to chose for themselves this will help empower them and give them the confidence to make sound decisions (hopefully) into their adult lives. But baby steps...screen time will still be limited and we will not be eating ice cream before dinner at least, not until the next “Yes Day”!

Birthday Traditions

In the midst of December, six days before Christmas to be exact is our eldest child's birthday. I despise the fact that her birthday is right before Christmas. Like, REALLY despise it. It's such a busy time that the added component of celebrating her birthday almost puts me over the edge. I try to remind myself that I should be thankful her birthday isn't on Christmas Eve or Christmas Day and I'm trying, REALLY trying to be better about voicing my negative opinion on this matter. I would feel terrible if my daughter ever felt bad or disappointed about her December birthday and don't ever want to feel that wer'e diminishing the day.

As a means to help keep my sanity I've developed a birthday template of sorts that makes both planning easy and the day (albeit in the midst of December) extra special for our daughter.  As an added bonus most of our traditions are really cost friendly which is helpful during December (actually, this is helpful all the time). Read on for my TAKE on birthday traditions.

Kate's Take Birthday Checklist

Streamers - We hang streamers from our children's bedroom doors the night before their birthday so they wake up to a fun surprise. This takes no more than 20 minutes and literally, entertains all the kids for a week until I get sick of them and tear them all down. We started this when my daughter turned 3 and have done it for our son as well.

Balloons - We started this tradition for all of our kids on their first birthday. There is nothing better than a large foil number balloon for a photo op. Just think...you'll never forget how old they were when you look back at photos with a number balloon in the background. I opt for gold or silver depending on the year.

Birthday Crown - This tradition also started on our eldest daughters first birthday and all of the kids wear this crown on their birthday. We got our crown from Oeuf and it's beautifully made and holding up quite nicely. There are a few other color options if a gold crown isn't your thing.

Donut Cake - I don't have anything against a real cake, I promise. However, I typically reserve a real cake for celebrating with extended family and/or friends. On the kids' actual birthday there is nothing better than a tower of donuts aka a donut cake for breakfast. We started this tradition for my daughters 3rd birthday and we've done a few different variations (mini donuts from Stan's in Chicago, a tower of glazed etc..) but the Hostess Donettes are at the top of Lucy's list. I love to add a number candle to the top (of course, we make her blow out a candle on the donut cake) and this year added some unicorn decorations for fun!

Birthday Cereal - This is a new tradition that I adapted from my sister-in-law who has done this for years. At the start of the week (Sunday) my husband took our daughter to the grocery store and let her pick out any cereal she wanted. This was a big deal as we typically stick to the non-sugary cereals. Our daughter was thrilled to pick out Lucky Charms which she then can eat for breakfast all week long. When it runs out, that's it. No more sugary cereal until her next birthday. I have to admit that she may be sharing a few marshmallow morsels with her younger brother so maybe just maybe he will reciprocate when his birthday rolls around. 

Scavenger Hunt - This is probably my favorite tradition. Again adapted from my sister-in-law (she has really good ideas) and is best suited for kids 4 and older. Eric Carle has this book called The Secret Birthday Message which is essentially about a message this boy receives that takes him on a hunt using shapes to find his birthday present. I love Eric Carle and children's books so naturally when I learned of this tradition I knew I wanted to start it in our family. We typically read the book the night before their birthday and in our case, give our daughter her "Secret Birthday Message" after school on her special day. It's so much fun to watch her run around the house in search of her most special gift. The night before my husband or I craft the message by using a mixture of words and drawings. Don't forget to keep the old messages as it helps in terms of coming up with different clues etc... This year our daughter discovered her gift behind her shower curtain.

Birthday Dinner - As the number of kids in our family has grown to three we like to take advantage of some one-on-one time when we can. One of those times is on their birthdays when we take them (starting at age 4) to a special dinner with Mom + Dad. Our daughter loves to go to Crosby's Kitchen in Chicago so she can finish her meal with a skillet cookie. And if your wondering...of course, I bring along that candle from the donut cake in the morning so we can sing Happy Birthday one last time.