So what DOES the tooth fairy pay these days?

DD finally lost a tooth. After wobbling a tiny bit for a long time, then a lot for a little time, then leaning precariously at a 45˚ angle for a few days, causing DD to sob in terror at the anticipated blood and gore losing it was going to entail, the first milk tooth finally came out.

I wasn’t there for the momentous occasion.

DD called me from my friend’s mobile phone when she was picked up from school.

“Mummy, I’m SO sorry. I lost my tooth,” she said.

I clucked congratulations down the line; it quite brought a tear to my eye as it seems like only yesterday I sat up in the night with her as she got the tooth in the first place.

“No, really, mummy! I really lost it! I don’t have it for the tooth fairy!”

I sensed the panic in her voice. Her friends had gotten five Dirhams (£1) per tooth. FIVE DIRHAMS!

Already DD has worked out that, with 20 teeth at Dhs 10 a pop, she'll get Dhs 200

When she got home, we went over the logistics of when, where, and how it got lost. I’m very good at finding things.  I was thinking I might nip down to the school and find the tooth. I wanted it more than she did; they’re precious to me, those little teeth.

“I was in the playground,” she said. “The grassy one… I had my tooth during snack and we only play there after snack. Actually, I only noticed it when I was eating my manakish. And I had that for lunch. I was eating my manakish and Best Friend asked me when my tooth had fallen out and I felt it and it wasn’t there!”

With a sinking feeling, I realised she’d most likely swallowed it with a bite of manakish. And yes, I love her, but no, I am not going through her pooh looking for it.

DD was inconsolable about the tooth fairy. I explained that, like Santa, the tooth fairy just “knew”. Still, DD wrote a note of apology explaining what had happened, popped it under her pillow and went to sleep determined to grin all night so any passing tooth fairy could see the gap.

Meantime, DH and I argued over how much to leave. I told him five Dirhams was the going rate and you really don’t want to upset the apple cart with the other mums. He wanted to give her Dhs 100 (£15). We agreed on Dhs 10.

I slipped it under her pillow with a note from the tooth fairy saying how she’d found the tooth at school and it was safe in her little bag now. In the morning, both DH and I went to wake her up.

Her face, on reading the note from the tooth fairy and finding the money was one of those moments I’ll never forget. Her excitement and wonder than the tooth fairy had come, had found her tooth AND had left money was one of the highlights of my life as a mum so far.

Now I just have to defend myself to the other mums for paying over the market rate…

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