Full Circle

Can you see what's missing here?

If you can, you're a better mum than I, who didn't notice for almost a whole day.

Yes, that's right. An entire day.

It would help if the kid got excited over these things, but he's so laid back about his body, he's so knowledgeable about how it grows and changes (all those anatomy lessons he demanded - I won't have anything left to teach him, come puberty), that he just takes it all in stride. I bet if his arm fell off, he'd shrug his remaining shoulder and assume a new one will grow in eventually.
Yes, my little Evil Genius lost a tooth. He lost it last night while we were at our regular Black Hat Society meeting, which is really more of a play group for our motley collection of boys at the moment. Apparently, he saw it fall out, but didn't feel the need to share that with me. I never knew the dang thing was even loose!

M has promised to look for it and save it if she or R (her husband) happens to find it. I'd kind of like it, but I'm not holding my breath. Look how tiny those teeth are!!

I didn't notice last night as we packed up to come home, or in the car, or as he yelled at me for making him go to bed at the obscenely early hour of one-o'clock, when a really good mum would let him stay up until at least dawn.

I didn't notice it this morning when he was downing homemade blueberry pancakes like he hadn't eaten in a month (Six? Six blueberry pancakes? I ask you, where does he put them??) - no, I thought a blueberry skin had gotten caught on his tooth...and I didn't even tell him to go brush, so double boo on me!

I didn't notice while he serenaded me with "I loooove youuuuuu...I'll love you until the end, which will never come...it's all about youuuu....I love youuuuuuu......"

I didn't notice it this afternoon while we sat together and read his new dinosaur book and shared some 'Nilla Wafers, or when we were playing Nintendo together (I play, he helps, and I already know why I'm a bad mum for this so don't press yourself to point it all out to me, thanks). Nope, not until late afternoon did I notice that what I'd thought was a blueberry skin was still there and decidedly not blueberry looking. He obligingly opened his mouth for my inspection, and explained when and where he'd lost his tooth.

And I missed it.

I'm bummed - I would have liked to have the tooth for a keepsake...and maybe the second one to make a pair of earrings...kidding! Or maybe not...

I'm a sentimental critter, I admit it, and I would have likely kept the tooth in with the lock from his first haircut (I waited until he was over a year old and it was almost Mother's day, got his first haircut and put the locks into silver, heart-shaped lockets for his grandmother's and me. Yep, schmaltz 'r' me). Now I'll have to hope to snag the second one and pretend until I am old and addled and actually believe it's his first. Sigh.

I shouldn't be surprised, really. When his teeth first came in (the one he lost was one of those), I had no idea. He didn't tell me about it, never let on he was ready to gnaw through tree branches on his own. No, it was an acquaintance who was dandling his five-month self on her knee who let me know he had teeth in. Not "coming in", in. Cut through the gums and rising up apace. And I'd had no idea. He would have been gnawing beef jerky before I noticed, I guess. In my defense, he never cried and he drooled fairly copiously from birth, so it's not like I had a clue.

So it makes sense that I wouldn't realize he was losing one. We've just come full circle.

Oh, and he's not worried about the tooth fairy or anything - we never really went over that, but he knows to let me know when the next one is loose, and to bring it to me when it falls out and I'll give him a prize. I bet I give him something way cooler than the tooth fairy would, anyway.