Mythological Creatures

In our family, Rob is in charge of all things mythological.  This means he handles all Tooth Fairy and Santa Claus interactions (and there's no Easter Bunny here). 

When I was growing up, my parents liked to keep us grounded in Reality, so there was no Santa Claus.  We each helped carry the presents to the tree on Christmas Eve, and Santa was sort of a joke.  It was well understood that Santa stood for Mom and Dad, so even if a present said "From Santa" on it, we'd say the word Santa while doing finger quotation marks in the air.

And we won't even go into the Tooth Fairy.  There's no point.  She never came.  Once I think my dad said, "Do you want a quarter?  I can give you a quarter."  But then again, he might not have said that, because there were 8 kids, and a quarter a tooth gets somewhat pricey.

In Rob's family, however, Santa was a source of delight, and the Tooth Fairy gave a faithful quarter per tooth.  One of Rob's siblings believed in Santa Claus until he or she was 12 years old.  In my family, we'd call that a tragedy and a horrible, horrible lie.  Shame on those parents.

So when Rob and I first got married, our longest and hardest discussion was about whether there would be mythological creatures in our home.  I said no.  He said yes.  I said it's lying.  He said it's fun. 

Through a series of events, we learned to compromise.  Now I help Rob shop for the Santa gifts, but he wraps them and labels them.  And while I may help eat Santa's cookies, I certainly don't write the kids notes from Santa.  And even though I bought a book called "I Believe in Santa Claus" which links the symbols of Santa Claus to Christ, don't ask me to say that I personally believe in Santa Claus.  (Some days I can say it without problem.  Other days I might just glare at you.)

(Miciah figured it out this year, which makes me incredibly happy!  (We've told her for years, she just was ready to hear it this time around.)  The boys probably won't ask for eons.  They're so trusting.  This makes it harder to deal with, by the way.  I think we ought to teach them to ask questions, and Rob will say to me, "Ah, just let them believe.")

Miciah figured out the Tooth Fairy when she was snooping through a drawer that she isn't allowed access to.  Fine with me; the Tooth Fairy is a pain in the butt.  Not only does the Tooth Fairy give the kids money (Rob let the Tooth Fairy give Miciah $1.50 for her first tooth.  That's ridiculous!), but our Tooth Fairies have names and write the kids notes.  Miciah's Tooth Fairy was Snaggletooth.  Elijah's Tooth Fairy is Fangtooth.  Good manly name, right?

This is the note Fangtooth wrote to Elijah:

Notice the picture of the tooth.  Yes, it's a tooth.  Rob drew it and it just kept getting worse and worse.  He finally wrote the words "I'm a tooth!" next to it, so you could tell what it was, and then put half dollars on for eyes (I've re-created the effect with quarters).

Elijah loved the note, and he was so excited about the whole thing.  He came to me and said, "Mom, the Tooth Fairy wrote me a note!"
"Yeah?" I said.
"Yeah!  And then, she drew me a picture of a girl.  That's funny, cause I'm a boy."

I just let it go and later informed Rob about what a great artist he is.

Elijah is now convinced that Fangtooth is a girl, because she drew a picture of a girl on the note.  Makes sense, no? 

I mean, as much as anything relating to mythological creatures can make sense.