A Dental Public Service Announcement

I have been working as a dentist for just about 8 months now - not a long time, but enough to get a sample of the different patients that come to a general dentist. I generally see a couple kids a day on average, and the dental I.Q. of parents really varies. Today I saw five kids that made up two families - these are families at one end of the education spectrum. In the first family, there were two children, ages 4.5 and almost 3. When I checked their teeth, I found thirteen cavities in the older boy's teeth. In younger girl's teeth, I found none. In the second family, there were three children, ages 6, 10, and 12. I found 7 cavities and one abscessed tooth in the youngest boy, one cavity in the middle boy's teeth, and no cavities in the oldest girl's teeth. The moral of the story is that girls take better care of their teeth. Ha! Just kidding. No, seriously, what the two boys have in common is that both sets of parents think that their kids are capable of brushing their teeth on their own. It is frustrating to find so many cavities in such young children, and it is really easy to blame parents. However, I think it is partly the dental community's fault for not providing better education for parents. So, this is my PSA for parents on how to care for your child's teeth!

1. Brush your child's teeth. If your child is not able to write in cursive, they don't have the manual dexterity to properly brush their teeth on their own. Encourage them to brush on their own, then check their brushing and give them feedback. There is a fun product you can buy called "Inspector Hector Plaque Detector" - have your child do their best to brush their teeth, then have them rinse with this mouthwash. The areas that they are missing will turn blue, so they can see where they need to improve. This isn't something you need to do every day, but it can be fun for everyone, even Mom and Dad, to see how good they are at brushing!

2. Brush your child's gums. Many cavities in baby teeth are found at the gumline, as this is where plaque or build-up accumulates.

3. Use toothpaste with fluoride once your child has teeth. Starting with the first baby teeth, use a small smear of fluoridated toothpaste (smaller than a pea). Older children that can spit can use more toothpaste.

4. Give your child milk at meals and water in between meals. There is no need to give your child juice as there is no nutritional benefit of juice - it is full of empty calories that can stunt your child's growth, and it can cause cavities! Even watered down juice still has sugar in it.

5. Please do not put anything but water in a bedtime cup or bottle. Milk, juice, Kool-Aid, etc. will coat their teeth all night long and feed the bacteria that cause cavities.

6. When giving your child a treat, pick something that they will eat and be done with it. Suckers, hard candy, grazing on M&M's for a long period of time - all of these will continue to coat your child's teeth with sugar, effectively feeding the bacteria for a longer period of time.

7. Take your child to the dentist for regular check-ups, starting at 6 months from when their first tooth comes in, or when they turn one. There are many dentists who don't want to see kids this young, and I get that. It's not easy, as many children are in the "stranger danger" phase and will cry when the dentist tries to look in their mouth. If you are consistently following the previous guidelines, you may not need to take your child to the dentist until age 3 or 4; however, for those parents who are unaware of how to care for their child's teeth, it can be too late if they wait until the child is 3 or 4. The bottom line is this: be proactive and look in your child's mouth when you brush their teeth. If you see dark spots, chips, discolored teeth, gum bumps or pimples, call up your dentist and have them take a look. It is so much easier to fix a little cavity than to deal with a hurting child with an infected tooth!

Wyatt's second haircut

Here is a picture of Wyatt before his haircut - he looks a little under the weather. No surprise, he has a mild temperature and runny nose. Poor guy.

I love this scowl - "Why are you taking my picture???"

After a bath - the finished haircut. I'm calling this his summer haircut - short! He definitely looks like a little boy!

Post haircut and bath, counting Mommy's fingers. Oh, what fun. :) He will NOT say "one" no matter how hard I try. He will say "two, three, four, five." But not "one." Silly boy. :)

I think he is feeling mellow because he's been sitting on my lap reading lots and lots of books. I'm guessing he will go to bed early tonight!

Good weekend

We got a lot of stuff done this weekend, and yet still had some time to relax. Aaron finished putting up the trim in the living room, dining room, and hallway - yay! I need to putty and paint it, and also sand, prime, and paint the doors and door-jams. Hopefully I will find some time to do that this summer.

Aaron also brought in the kitchen table and hung up the picture. He painted that back when we lived in Iowa City, but we had nowhere to put it. I really like it here. So does Reuben. :)

Aaron saw this patio furniture in the Blain's farm and fleet ad, so we went to look at it. It's a really great deal - way better than anything at Target or Wal-mart! (Aaron did have to put it all together, so I'm sure that's part of why it was so inexpensive.) We did get two of the pillows and rug at Target - they just do decorative stuff so well. We sat out on the deck this afternoon while Wyatt was napping and enjoyed the sunshine. I can't wait for the weather to be just a tiny bit warmer so we can be outside even more!

We put the infant car-seat and bases in the cars... I washed and put away baby clothes... Put away the cloth diapers... And I also realized I don't have any changing pad covers that don't have elephants on them. I had two for Wyatt that matched his bedding, but Henry's bedding set didn't come with any. I thought I'd just pick up some plain ones at Target, but they only had one kind - pink polka dots! No good. Wal-mart had NO changing pad covers. They didn't even sell the changing pads for the changing tables! So where in the world am I supposed to find some??? Thank goodness for Amazon.com.

Henry's room will be done soon. Just some finishing touches and arranging things. If he decided to come even earlier than April 6th, we'd probably be fine. I think I'd be scrambling a little to get everyone packed, but we'd manage.

Well, I need to go rescue Wyatt out of his high chair. He had some chocolate pudding for dessert, and it's going to be tons of fun to clean up. :)

Saying hello!

Tonight we practiced saying "hi" to all of the different family members - this started when Wyatt had his play phone and he was calling his Grandma's and Grandpa's. So I had him say everyone's names, and there are some cute ones! Here's a little shout-out to Rachael and Justin all the way in California! :)

Girls Day Out!!!

Today my mom, sister, sister-in-laws, adopted sister-in-law :), and I had a girls day out. My mom has had this day planned out for awhile, and we had no idea what was in store until Valentines day. Personally, I thought she was having us save a Saturday so we could help her clean out her garage... Just kidding. :) We had breakfast at her house, then went to La James for a spa morning. We started out with massages, then had facials, and ended with pedicures. I think we all enjoyed the massages the best! Then we had lunch at SoHo and finished the afternoon shopping downtown Cedar Falls. Thanks to the guys for watching the kids! And thanks to Mom for such a fun girl's day!!

A sneak peak of Baby Henry's room

We got some good work done on Henry's room! Well, most of it was done by Aaron as it was lifting boxes, moving furniture, and putting together the dresser. I just put his crib bedding together. :) We have a few more things to do, then I'll post more pictures!

Can't believe he'll be on his way in 4 weeks!

Update on Cholestasis

So, today I had yet another OB appointment. I've had a few blood tests - the bile acid test came back borderline, but just within the normal range. My liver test came back high the first time, but after I was on the medication, it was back in the normal range. The medication seemed to make the itching stop, so my doctor had me quit the medication on Friday to see if the itching would come back. If it did, then we would know I have cholestasis; if not, then it was a fluky thing. Well, Sunday night it came back and was driving me nuts, so I went back on the medication. Today the doctor told us that since my symptoms came back, we are going with the cholestasis diagnosis. I got to have my blood drawn yet again... yay. :) And, we set a date for me to be induced. She wants to induce labor somewhere between 36 and 37 weeks when she is on call, so the date will be April 6th! Less than a month away! So, needless to say I am feeling motivated to get everything ready before the baby gets here!

First trip to Four Queens!

We were brave - we ordered a baby cone with barely any ice cream over the top. I happened to have a bib in my purse... He did really well! He's still working on it now in his high chair at home.
I try to take a picture of Aaron, and this is what I get... Sigh. :)

The best thing ever - Chocolate and Strawberry stacked ice cream cone. Yum! Now that I've eaten it, the baby is kicking like crazy. I think he likes it too!

32 week update

I'm 32 weeks as of Friday! I'm getting to the lovely uncomfortable stage of pregnancy. Large. Very large. :)

I went to the doctor on Friday for another check-up. The blood tests came back, and my bile salt level was borderline, but just in the normal range. However, with my symptoms improving by taking the medication, it's unclear if I have a mild case of cholestasis. So, the plan right now is for me to quit taking the medication and see if the symptoms come back. If they do, then I have cholestasis and we have to induce around 36-37 weeks. If they don't come back, we assume it was a fluke, and go on with normal appointments. We'll see what happens!