Loose teeth!

The tooth fairy is very generous at our house. Now, I have heard of other houses where she is more generous but at our house the going rate for a baby tooth is $2. I think this is a little extravagant but my children are thrilled whenever they discover another loose tooth. This is their main source of income. We do not give out regular allowances, and we've never given our children their own spending money just because. Basically, the children have only their loose teeth to depend on for regular revenue.
Recently our older son, who is seven, discovered one of his front teeth was very loose. I can not tell you the excitement this caused. He started immediately counting the money in his mind and planning a trip to the store. I looked forward, with anticipation, to the cute little jack-o-lantern smile I knew was coming. Unfortunately, the tooth, though quite wiggly, was taking its time in coming out. One night, he attempted to help it along with a string and a door. I'm not kidding, he really tied a string to his tooth and slammed the door. Unfortunately the string slipped off the tooth and it remained (somewhat) firmly imbedded in the gumline. He, then, attempted to pull it using pliers. This too failed. For weeks he has been trying to dislodge the tooth, which is literally hanging by a thread. In the meantime, both his sisters also discovered loose teeth in their mouths. His older sister lost hers within about two days of its first wiggle and claimed her $2 the next morning. His younger sister lost hers the very next night and discovered $2 under her pillow as well. The tooth fairy was probably considering taking on another job just to keep up with the expenses at the Burke household. Still, our son's tooth hung there limply in its place. He wiggled, he waggled, he twisted, he pushed for weeks! He started to resemble a famous red-neck tow truck from a popular children's movie with his tooth sticking out at an odd angle when he smiled. Then this afternoon he told me another tooth was loose as well. "Great," I said, "that means the first one will come out. I'm sure you won't have two loose at once."
I was right. Just this evening, after being sent to bed, he came out of his room bleeding profusely from the mouth and announced, "I lost my tooth!" Yea!!!! The time had finally come! The money for him, a jack-o-lantern smile to replace the "Mater" grin I was so sick of! Our joy was immense! We cleaned up the blood and got him tucked back in bed and I asked, before he went to sleep, to see his new hole-y smile. He happily obliged. And when he did I saw a beautiful gaping hole... right next to that horrible, loose, wiggly snaggle tooth! UGH! I can't believe it! It is still hanging on while all the other teeth in this house seem to be falling like dominoes!
Nevertheless, he will get his money, he does have a "Halloween" smile.... and the tooth fairy will undoubtedly start checking monster.com, in the hopes that some day she will be able to collect the "Mater tooth" as well!