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Tooth Fairy - what’s the going rate?


Spryte
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I think whatever the tooth fairy can afford - both financially and time-wise. We've known people who have a wide range of what the fairy leaves and does. We did minimal money and nothing else (except once we left a note, but that was because of the situation). But my kids are in college now. Whatever we did or didn't do did not seem to have any lasting impact on them. 

IMHO, glitter is evil and never gets all cleaned up. Just no. 
 

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We went to the bank and got golden dollar coins (Sacajawea and President coins) for the younger two. I kept them in my jewelry box. So they got $1 but it was a special $1. I remember when my now 19 year old came flying down the stairs shouting "gold! The tooth fairy brought me GOLD!" 

I dont remember what we did for Oldest but it was probably about $1 too... 

But the rate my have adjusted for inflation. 

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17 minutes ago, ashfern said:

What I've done for all of my kids is when they lose their first tooth they get to pick any toy they want from the store (with my guidance so it's not the $300 lego set). That's it! I don't "do" teeth. 🤢  I think some of my friends are up to $1 per tooth!! 

Don't toys cost more than $1?

 

This is very equivalent to what we do. My husband has a "Tooth collection" -- he pays for the kids teeth ($2 each I believe, but if it came out particularly traumatically and we have more cash they have been known to get more) WE weren't comfortable with the Tooth fairy.

 

 

Edited by vonfirmath
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31 minutes ago, ashfern said:

What I've done for all of my kids is when they lose their first tooth they get to pick any toy they want from the store (with my guidance so it's not the $300 lego set). That's it! I don't "do" teeth. 🤢  I think some of my friends are up to $1 per tooth!! 

With inflation, $1 per tooth is just not that much. Even if you have ten kids, that money spread out over their combined childhoods really shouldn't break the bank unless you're always close to the wire.

When the kids were little they got either two dollar bills or dollar coins. If they got bills, I folded them into hearts. But we only did "pretend" tooth fairy - quite aside from my serious questions about the ethics of "fun lying", I'm actually no good at it, so the kids always knew the tooth fairy was the adults. The older one is about to get their wisdom teeth pulled - even though they're nearly an adult, I might slip something under their pillow.

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42 minutes ago, ashfern said:

What I've done for all of my kids is when they lose their first tooth they get to pick any toy they want from the store (with my guidance so it's not the $300 lego set). That's it! I don't "do" teeth. 🤢  I think some of my friends are up to $1 per tooth!! 

A dollar per tooth is  very little. I'm very confused how a toy would be cheaper...

Edited by hippiemamato3
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7 minutes ago, hippiemamato3 said:

A dollar per tooth is  very little. I'm very confused how a toy would be cheaper...

 

She's probably thinking she bought one toy per kid. So long as that toy retails under $20, she got a bargain.

Which, fine, you do you - but it still seems a little silly to make horrified faces at the idea of spending a whole $32 per child, spread out over six-ish years.

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$1 per tooth. They know the tooth fairy is me and they always have, but it's still fun to pretend she's real and get money under your pillow 🙂

The tooth fairy has been known to be forgetful around here and sometimes needs a reminder or two to do her job. The first time it happened D'S wrote a cute note explaining that he should get more money for having to wait and she gave him an extra quarter and a note in return saying he got extra this once for ingenuity but not to expect it next time 😆

The tooth fairy has also been reminded who sleeps on which bunk (top or bottom).

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1 hour ago, Spryte said:

What does the tooth fairy bring at your place? 
 

Is there anything else s/he does?  (Answer or leave letter and notes, leave little glitter trails, that sort of thing.)

DH is the tooth fairy here. $1 per tooth, and the only special thing he does is occasionally forget to drop off the money and has to plant it during breakfast and then suggest people look again. So there is no secret at all, just some exaggerated winking.

I like the Korean tradition of throwing the tooth over the house. No one wants those old teeth later anyway.

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Fun!  I love reading these.

DD has been writing letters to the tooth fairy for the last five teeth or so.  It’s nice, but getting a bit tedious. 🤣 I can’t think of a way to nicely stop the habit, other than growing up.

And thanks to DS watching some now-cancelled show before losing his first tooth, when he was small, ours leaves “trinkets.”  Sigh.  That show should never have made it into production!  Gaaah.  The trinkets are under $1 in value - for DD it might be something like a tiny bottle of nail polish or some special pencils.  I just keep a tiny stash.

I don’t do glitter, but we have a friend who does.  

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10 minutes ago, SusanC said:

 

I like the Korean tradition of throwing the tooth over the house. No one wants those old teeth later anyway.

Right?!? Old teeth.  Ick!

DS’s best friend once absolutely dissolved into screams while they were playing Lego.  She found an old tooth in the Lego bin. Aaack!

Edited by Spryte
Apparently autocorrect doesn’t agree with me
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I’m a traditionalist in that area. $1 per tooth and no extra fanfare. I think getting a special fairy to collect your tooth and leave cash is miraculous enough, lol.

Also, the tooth fairy does’t pay past the age of ten.  Yeah, we’ve still had believers and very lazy parents.

We paid more when the girls had simultaneous failed root canals from a crummy dentist and had to get them simultaneously pulled.  I don’t remember how much, but I felt really bad, so it was probably a good premium.

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DH was the tooth fairy and would type elaborate notes for them. He created themed stationary and went all out with his notes. They're fun to look back at now.

I think each child got about $1/tooth and a coin from a foreign country. My grandpa collected coins from before WWII, so there were lots of coins. It was a good opportunity to bring a bit of history and geography into play. We would look up the emblems on the coins, try to figure out what the motto on the coin meant, which language it was in, etc. I enjoyed doing that with the kids.

I wouldn't have done any notes for the kids because they were tedious and dh wouldn't have done the coins because... who cares?, so this was a good mix for both of us to participate.

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My kids got a math problem. 😉

20 teeth x 6 kids x $1/tooth = nope.

We knew early on that we wanted more than a few children, and I knew that it was something that I really didn't want to keep up with.  We have never done the tooth fairy, but one of my kids found out that Grandma and Grandpa do. :)  She lost two teeth at their house in the same weekend, and got $1 per tooth from each grandparent.

Dd10 lost one of her teeth at church during our annual missions conference.  When some of the missionaries noticed, several of them gave her a coin from their display tables.  She has a coin each from Australia, Ukraine, and Brazil. :)

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32 minutes ago, wendyroo said:

$1 per tooth.  And I did not want to be scrambling for singles late at night, so shortly after each baby was born I went to the bank and asked for 20 crisp dollars which I keep in the back of my bathroom closet for Tooth Fairy purposes. 

I'm impressed that you planned ahead like that!

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31 minutes ago, wendyroo said:

$1 per tooth.  And I did not want to be scrambling for singles late at night, so shortly after each baby was born I went to the bank and asked for 20 crisp dollars which I keep in the back of my bathroom closet for Tooth Fairy purposes. 

Brilliant.

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At first, our tooth fairy was very inconsistent.  One tooth might be a toy that I had pre-bought for Christmas or birthday.  Another tooth might be a dollar.  A third tooth might be four pennies and some pocket lint.  And often she forgot.  

Then second child was super freaked out by the tooth fairy, so we had a ceremony and declared the fae were not welcome in our house.  Really, a relief all around.  

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6 hours ago, Tanaqui said:

 

She's probably thinking she bought one toy per kid. So long as that toy retails under $20, she got a bargain.

Which, fine, you do you - but it still seems a little silly to make horrified faces at the idea of spending a whole $32 per child, spread out over six-ish years.

I interpreted it as the time, not the money, she wasn't interested in using for this.

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We do around 1 to 2 dollars -ish, based on what we have around and if the tooth came out in a tough way--also on condition.  One tooth with a HUGE cavity only got 50 cents.  It came out shortly after we discovered our son had, for some time, thought it was hilarious to go "brush" his teeth with the handle end of his toothbrush, without toothpaste, and then tell us he had brushed.

 

The tooth fairy often takes a few nights to get here at our house.  The kids don't necessarily expect the tooth to be gone the first morning.  She is, after all, a very busy fairy.

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They got $5 for the first one and $2 or 3 for the rest, I can't remember. I don't really do up the fictional gift givers, and I have ADHD, so DD11 figured it out really quick. Now she just asks me to buy Robux for her. 😄 DS7 still believes. He lost his first tooth at Yellowstone and the tooth fairy did manage to find us, even in a tent. 😁

One of the girls at my daughter's gym gets $50. Our best friend's sons get a chocolate coin. 

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My oldest loved coins as a preK'er and that's when she lost her first tooth. So, Zelda, the tooth fairy (oldest only really wanted to know her name) brought 41 cents for every tooth (a quarter, a dime, a nickel and a penny). "Lots of circle money!" according to oldest. Giving only change worked for us since we have a big change jar so we always had change no matter when their teeth fell out. Zelda wrote a note for the first time thanking them for the tooth.

Most kids around here got $5 for the first tooth and then $1 after. My niece and nephew got $20 for first, $5 for every one after. 

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17 minutes ago, happysmileylady said:

$2 for the first tooth and $1 for each additional.

Having said that, while my kids do believe in the tooth fairy.....it's just not a big deal for them because they just don't seem to be motivated by money.  They don't really have a whole lot of wants lol.  

My oldest has lost four teeth since we’ve been stuck at home.  She has nowhere to spend her money and no real concept of saving it and eventually leaves it on the floor somewhere.  I swear we’ve given her the same $1 two or three times...

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1 hour ago, Michelle Conde said:

I interpreted it as the time, not the money, she wasn't interested in using for this.

Well, until and unless she comes back we'll never know, but the comment said nothing about time. It DID say:

Quote

I think some of my friends are up to $1 per tooth!! 

and with the double exclamation point I think most of us interpreted her complaint as being about the exorbitant cost of $1 per tooth. I will go on record as saying that I don't think that's very expensive.

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I used to give a dollar per tooth.  At first it was fun, hiding it under the pillow like magic ... until that time it got lost and there was drama.

One day I just got sick of it and gave my kids a buck for every tooth still in their mouths, and said that's it for the tooth fairy!

I might be a grinch.

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I think my kids each got a quarter for the first couple of teeth, and then I'd forget and they'd forget... it faded away. I do remember one of my kids told me that she was putting a special tooth fairy box (can't remember where she got it) and please don't forget to put a quarter in. 

IOW, the tooth fairy was a failure here!  

 

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4 hours ago, Michelle Conde said:

The tooth fairy often takes a few nights to get here at our house.  The kids don't necessarily expect the tooth to be gone the first morning.  She is, after all, a very busy fairy.

Yeah, this house had a pretty forgetful tooth fairy as the kids got older 🙄

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11 hours ago, marbel said:

I think my kids each got a quarter for the first couple of teeth, and then I'd forget and they'd forget... it faded away. I do remember one of my kids telling me one time that she was putting a special tooth fairy box (can't remember where she got it) and please don't forget to put a quarter in. 

IOW, the tooth fairy was a failure here!  

 

 

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I love all these tooth fairy stories. My favorite came late in the losing teeth stage. Ds was 11 and heard from a friend that they leave their teeth in a glass of water, in the bathroom, with a note for the fairy telling her what color to make the water. The note this fairy received said to turn it green with gold sparkles. Oh bother, I was not going to lose. haha I found the food coloring but the gold was a challenge. Glitter glue! 

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On 9/21/2020 at 6:45 PM, Tanaqui said:

Well, until and unless she comes back we'll never know, but the comment said nothing about time. It DID say:

and with the double exclamation point I think most of us interpreted her complaint as being about the exorbitant cost of $1 per tooth. I will go on record as saying that I don't think that's very expensive.

Personally, I think that teeth are gross and saving them is disgusting. I wasn't complaining about anything just sharing what I did, an alternative as it were, without disparaging the people who "do" teeth and the tooth fairy. I'll share here that we don't "do" Santa gifts either. 😲

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On 9/21/2020 at 10:03 AM, Spryte said:

Fun!  I love reading these.

DD has been writing letters to the tooth fairy for the last five teeth or so.  It’s nice, but getting a bit tedious. 🤣 I can’t think of a way to nicely stop the habit, other than growing up.

And thanks to DS watching some now-cancelled show before losing his first tooth, when he was small, ours leaves “trinkets.”  Sigh.  That show should never have made it into production!  Gaaah.  The trinkets are under $1 in value - for DD it might be something like a tiny bottle of nail polish or some special pencils.  I just keep a tiny stash.

I don’t do glitter, but we have a friend who does.  

We had a phase where a ds liked trinkets. I found good stuff at Hobby Lobby—a ‘diamond’ on the jewelry making aisle, some other ‘jewel’, and some shells are the ones I can remember off the top of my head. 

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