Getting a Christmas visit from Santa... and the Tooth Fairy?!

Howdy Friends and Loved Ones! I'm so impressed with all of the beautiful Christmas cards we received this year! Every year I decide that THIS is the year that I'll send out cards too, but nope, again the day comes and goes before I even come close to doing them. I actually bought cards this year, so I did mean to, but this blog is as close as I'll get to it this time. Sorry!!

I hope all your Christmas wishes came true this year and that you had a happy New Year. Ours was fun and family-filled with the thought lurking in the back of our mind that the next two Christmas holidays will be minus Mom and Dad. Yep, they got their mission call to the England Manchester Mission and will report to the MTC on March 5th for their 18 month mission. This is the same mission that my sister Natalie was called to 8 years ago. Mom and Dad had friends just return from being a Senior Missionary Couple there and they've got several friends from Natalie's mission days that recommended them to the Mission President so they were very hopeful that they would be called there. They've been packed and ready to go ever since our house fire, so it's somewhat agonizing for them to have to wait 2 more months... but they're thrilled with the call.

For all of you waiting with bated breath to see us on 1 vs. 100, you'll have to wait a little longer. Noel was #66 on the show before the Christmas episode with the guy contestant who kept jumping. I know what Noel looks like and it was still hard to catch a glimpse of him. Shaun had slightly more air-time as an audience member since he was seated right behind the contestant's ex-girlfriend. You can see him really well for about 1/2 a second when she stands up to clap, but mostly you just see his hand alot. The episodes in which we are in the mob will be airing the 2nd, 3rd, or 4th week in January according to the staff. Shaun is number #97 with the contestant who's a computer programmer and I'm with the next contestant (the lady dentist) as square #46. I'm not allowed contractually to say anything about how we did on the show, but I will say that if you happen to be busy collecting lint from your bellybutton and somehow miss the show, we wouldn't be upset.

One good thing to come from being on the show... I was on the same episode with the men from the "Men of Mortuary" calendar and got one of their calendars for free. I generously re-gifted it to my sister Cheri for her to display in her cubicle at work. I think I can honestly say it was in the Top 5 of awesome gifts opened this year, as evidenced by her reaction... of embarassment.

Another in the Top 5 category was a gift that Cheri and I both got this year. Mom told us that we both needed to open it at the same time after she read us the poem that goes with it. She said "I wonder how long it'll take before you figure it out" and started the poem. She got as far as the title "From the Real Tooth Fairy" before Cheri let out a gasp and said "I know!". I had to think one more second and said "Me too!" and we both erupted into laughter while Mom read the rest. To fully appreciate the gift I need to fill you in on the history of it all though...

Teeth are a big deal in my family. My Dad was a dentist. He was a Professor of Dentistry at UCLA since the year I was born and all three of us girls became his experimental subjects for all things new and cutting-edge in dentistry. When we go to UCLA for dental work they bring out the files on us and I'm not kidding when I say it's the thickness of a metropolitan Yellow Pages book. They even found my old neck gear in one of them once. Despite the fact that the equipment he used sometimes looked like it came from a Frankenstein movie, all of our teeth are now straight and beautiful. That's why we were thrilled, but not too surprised, that when we left teeth we had lost under our pillow the Tooth Fairy left an entire Silver Dollar for us. Other kids got quarters and the such, but we got the heavy-in-your-hand, too-big-to-fit-a-gumball-machine silver dollar. These were quality teeth you know!

Dad advised us that the Silver Dollar wasn't something we should just leave lying around. He told us that, if we wanted to, he would keep it for us in his fire-proof safe alongside the other important documents like our birth certificates and passports. Where else would we keep something that important? So, in it went into the fire-proof safe. Every tooth we left we'd get a Silver Dollar, and in it went, into the fire-proof safe where the IMPORTANT stuff was, safe and locked up.

I can't remember exactly when it happened, but I was around twenty-something when I needed my birth certificate for something, and I followed Dad to the safe for it. "Oh yeah!", I said. "Can you bring out all the coins too?".

He got this blank look and said, "all the coins?".

"Yep, you know the coins we got from the Tooth Fairy?"

"Oh, sure, here it is", he said, and handed me a Silver Dollar.

"What about the rest of them? I don't even know how many I got... like ten or fifteen... right?"

"Umm... well... actually it's just that one."

"Huh? No, I got a bunch of them. Cheri and Natalie, too. Where are theirs?"

"You're holding it."

Yep, that's right. He just kept putting the same coin under our pillows! Our darling Father conned each of us out of twenty teeth worth of Tooth Fairy money! We were so shocked that our no-nonsense Papa could pull it off so successfully that we all had a good laugh over it and have teased him about it at every opportunity. Well, no longer! Cheri and I both opened boxes containing twenty silver dollars, Pocahontas gold-colored dollars, and any other coins of value that the REAL Tooth Fairy could find. Here is the poem:

"Greetings From the Real Tooth Fairy"

Greetings from the real Tooth Fairy,
Not from the substitute guy called Larry.

I was in shock when I heard what he pulled,
He just offered my job to help be fulfilled.

That was so sneaky, to fool you, I say,
Then again your sisters, the very same way!

We trusted him wholly, this cad of a Dad,
That's twenty teeth each, you little girls had.

Larry would chortle, feeling so smart,
Thought it was classic, right from the start.

Mom always warned him, "this will come back to bite ya",
Let's gang up on him girls... Larry, we gotcha!

"Daddy, can we see our dollars, all in their glory?"
Larry, caught by surprise, told a sweet little story.

Pure silver dollars are now far in between, ah...
How 'bout I throw in some Sacagawea.

I'm sorry my darlings, it was only a joke.
I'll pay up in full and hope I don't choke.

Here's me with my portion of the coins, each individually wrapped.



All in all, a wonderful Christmas...

Shaun was ready for a nap after all the festivities.



Here's hoping that 2007 brings joy to you all!

-Kristy (& Shaun)