15 Heathly Loose Tooth Foods

OK here are some things I've been trying... This is one of those lists that's endless, so I know as soon as I publish this I'll think of ten more things!! LOL

1) Sliced banana (or any sliced fruit, for that matter)
2) Sliced avocado
3) Soup
4) Yogurt
5) Porridge
6) Whole grain pancakes
7) Cheese
8) Eggs
9) Peanut butter
10) Fruit smoothies
11) Cooked mashed veggies
12) Pasta
13) Rice pudding
14) Homemade pudding (made with real milk and reduced sugar)
15) Apple sauce

Kids and Asthma

Thank you, Dr. Rhonda Low, for pointing out that too clean isn't always better. I'm referring to her story about rising asthma rates in kids, and how under utilized immune systems (created from over clean environments) can overreact to benign things such as dust and pests.

Ah ha! Finally. My not vacuuming daily has been vindicated. OK so I'm a bit of a germaphobe with the kitchen counters and the toilets, but the carpets are lucky if they see the vacuum cleaner more than 2 or 3 times per week. Wahoo!!! Hey maybe I should do less laundry too. Hmmm. This theory definitely has potential. Hey, it's good for the kids, right?

Still Hanging

Actually it's a bottom front tooth, so technically it's not hanging. It's still firmly rooted in her little mouth, blocking entry to anything healthy that needs chewing.

I was lucky to get apple in her today - I sliced it into thin wedges, gave her some caramel dip, and showed her how to shove it in her mouth from the side (and told her it was OK to get caramel on her cheek). The sliced carrots would have been as easy to eat but apparently the lack of caramel dip for them was too much for her tooth to bear. At least the avocado slices were soft.

For breakfast she and her brother had peanut butter and banana (banana slices with dabs of PB on them), which made it past the tooth OK. The afternoon snack of ice cream went over well, although she didn't eat the cone, even though it was pink! (So maybe she IS telling the truth about her tooth hurting ;-)

We'll see how tomorrow goes. Refresh my memory, anyone - how long do these loose teeth take to fall out? At least she spends a lot of time wiggling it - showing people, checking it, scaring her brother (kidding, but I'm sure she wishes it did). I don't know why it's such an inconvenience to me - she's almost always been a picky eater. At least now, though, she has some kind of excuse...

Ouch

Ok I forgot (about the loose tooth). Oooooh, baaaad Mommy. I wash doing my "Mommy brush" of her teeth, vigorously battling my parental fears of inadequacy, when sure enough:

"OOOUCH!!"

Aw geez... as if I don't feel bad enough for not having the backbone to lance the blister on her foot ("NO Mommy, it will HURT!"), now I get to feel guilty about not paying enough attention to to her childhood dental milestones.

At least I hug her a lot. That should count for something, shouldn't it??

Loose Tooth

My daughter said to me this morning: "Look, Mommy! Look!"

Her finger was madly wiggling one of her front bottom teeth back and forth. "What if I swallow it?"

Wow! She has been listening to my paranoid rants about choking. Now of course I'm at a loss for words (it was bound to happen).

"Uh, um, I don't thing you will. Not today, anyway. It's not loose enough."

We ended up late for school because of the lengthy debate as to the appropriate method of brushing a newly loose tooth. Try as I might to get her to just brush the darn thing, she had a million things to say about it. I won't detail them here. I'm not sure how much storage space Blogger gives us.

Now my next task is to brush up on Tooth Fairy protocol. I've heard that these days payment can range from $2-$5 per tooth! Yikes. Sometimes progress is not good. There was no Internet or blogs when I lost my baby teeth, but then it only cost my parents a quarter. At least I think... maybe it was a dime. Hmmm. My really really blonde hairs are showing.

Speaking of teeth, I can hear my son starting to brush his, which is never a neat endeavour without adult supervision. 'Bye for now...