It started with elephants. Tiny elephants dashing across her little teeth. Then there were the giraffes and the wildebeests and the gnus. I’d imagine we’ll spot a monkey in there before too long.
That’s right. There’s a safari in my daughter’s mouth. And there’s only one way to get those pesky animals out of there: With a toothbrush.
For a brief and glorious period, having a shiny new toothbrush was incentive enough to get Poppy to brush her teeth. Once that was old, though, it turned into a great and terrible fight every morning. (She brushes her teeth at night, too. But bedtime is Daddy time. And Daddy doesn’t need gimmicks, apparently.)
I think I must’ve read about this trick somewhere else, and I’m so glad it came back to me one morning while Pi had her little hand pressed against her mouth. Because I was getting really tired of prying it away to brush her teeth. She’s been a more-than-willing tooth-brusher since that first morning that I said, “What about the elephants? How will we get the elephants off of your teeth?!” It’s a nice change. And I hope it keeps working for me for a good, long time.
Visit We are That Family for more Works for Me Wednesday tips!
Good idea! I’ll have to remember that if we ever meet with resistance. Right now, Wendy “brushes” her own teeth while I do mine in the morning, and then in the evening she gets a thorough brushing from her Daddy. Our biggest hang-up is the “my turn” and “I do it.”
Jeni´s last blog post: “WFMW: What Helps Me Clean House“
My son had lots of ear infections when he was younger. We told him about the “monkeys” that were in his ears–we needed to see them, we needed to doctor them, we needed to clean them out, etc. It helped us then. I hadn’t thought of using the same thing for my daughter’s teeth. . .Thanks for the idea!
rachel@justanotherdayinparadise´s last blog post: “you eat WHAT?!“
We’ve just started that fight with Zach. And he’s too young for the elephant thing. But I’ll bear that in mind in a year or so.
A Free Man´s last blog post: “Wish in one hand…“
My parents used this on me and my sisters when we were kids. Funny that I remember such a thing. Must have worked! (Oh, and sometimes it was Sesame Street characters that were hiding, or any other random people/characters which were the fun of the time. Perhaps even Strawberry Shortcake and friends.)