Dirty, Funny Money

So.  Kyle finally lost his first tooth.  When I picked him up from school on Wednesday afternoon, he came running out of the classroom, brandishing his face like a trophy.  Toothy, gappy grin jutting forward, the excitement just jumping off of him.   “Now I get a golden coin from the Tooth Fairy!” he cried.

Oh, crap.  In yet another Mom Fail Moment, I had forgotten to line up the gold coins in advance.  But somewhere in the recesses of my memory, going at least as far back as June when we moved, I remembered seeing gold coins in my Tupperware box of coins destined for the Coin Star machine.  You know, when I get around to it.  Someday.

So after Kyle went to sleep, I broke out the box.  I poured the giant avalanche of change out onto a towel to try and stifle the noise a bit.  There was the usual assortment of pennies, nickels, dimes and quarters – I’d estimate at least $250 worth, so maybe I should stop procrastinating my trip to the Coin Star machine!  After I sifted and sorted through all that coinage, my hands were filthy.  But, to my satisfaction, I found the following selection of coins that just didn’t fit in:

• 5 Chuck E. Cheese tokens
• $3.3o in Euro coins
• $6 in pesos
• One bicentennial 50 cent piece
• $10.50 in Woodstock ’94 money
• 100 Colones from Costa Rica
• And the big winner, four golden James Monroe dollar coins

Guess which one the Tooth Fairy put beneath Kyle’s pillow?