snaggletooth grins

For at least 5 months people have been telling me whenever they see Julia Ellen with her fingers in her mouth, "Oh, she must be teething!" But I knew better since none of my children had their first tooth emerge before 9 months of age. Will was the latest at 11.5 months, leaving me to endure well meaning Italian grandmother's advice for ages. Our household was starting to take bets as to whether Julia Ellen was going to eat her birthday cake with no teeth, when at supper last night I slid my finger along her bottom gum. When I grinned and said, "It's here!" Will crowed with delight at retaining his much coveted record.

Not 5 minutes later we were subjected to Maggie complaining that she couldn't blow a bubble with her Valentine Day gum because of her super duper wiggly front tooth. "I'll get a bit of gauze and see if we can get it out," I said as I pulled down the wooden box in which we store medical supplies on the top of the fridge. It only took a mere touch to extract her dangling tooth, but then she found she couldn't blow a bubble because she doesn't have enough teeth left to pull the gum back over her tongue. Apparently those same genes which drags out seeing that first baby tooth are also responsible for their adult teeth to slowly emerge from the gums. Not one of Maggie's 5 lost baby teeth over the past year has fully come in. As a result, the poor child looks like she was recently in a bar fight with a brawling biker named Otto. I am grateful for the umpteenth time that we homeschool and my poor child doesn't have to put up with horrible little boys calling her names. But in the name of socialization we will tease her a little. A very little, for she is still a beautiful child, despite the gap tooth grin.