At some point your little toothless butter ball is going to sprout some teeth. Toddlers teeth appear in a fairly predictable pattern: two on the bottom in front, four on the top in front, two more on the bottom front, four molars two on top and two on the bottom, four canines two on top and two on bottom, and finally four more molars. From the time that your baby's first tooth sprouts it is time to start implementing oral care. For the first six months or so, after those first couple of teeth show up, a washcloth dipped in a weak mixture of water and baking soda should be enough to combat any type of decay. However, at some point you will need to introduce the toothbrush in order to continue to maintain good oral hygiene for your toddler. Here are a few more helpful ideas for getting the most out of your little beavers tooth brushing routine.
1. Get an electric toothbrush.
It may seem a bit extravagant, but for your toddler it will make brushing his teeth a lot more fun. A regular tooth brush is fine if you can't afford or find an electric one, but it has a lot of drawbacks. Firstly, your little grin master will only let a foreign object which is under your control in his mouth for a very limited time, so getting to all the teeth and brushing them thoroughly will be harder. Also, your toddler will quickly lose interest in the idea of using the regular toothbrush as a tooth-cleaning tool and will begin to think of it as a funny spoon that is for feeding him baby toothpaste, which kind of defeats the purpose. And finally, the struggles that you have over trying to get your little guy to use the regular toothbrush properly might instill a strong aversion to the idea of brushing teeth. An electric model is interesting, fun and easy to use. You can often brush your little chompers teeth in half the time with half the struggle.
2. Teach your toddler to chew gum.
I know that this might sound counter intuitive, and just so we are clear I'm not talking about huge wads of sugary goo. I'm just talking about huge wads of goo. The American Dental Association has come out in support of sugar free gum, especially gum that contains xylitol. They recommend giving your children gum to chew for about 20 minutes after meals in addition to regular brushing. To teach your toddler how to chew gum, give her a large amount to start with. One and a half sticks should be enough to discourage swallowing without raising the risk of choking. The entire wad should be about the size of your toddlers thumb. After your toddler has gotten the basic idea of chewing without swallowing, you can reduce the amount of gum you give.
3. Offer your toddler a sippy cup of water before bed.
Throughout the day food, milk and juice will leave residue in your toddlers mouth. Even if you brush once in the afternoon and once at bedtime the food and drink particles in your little nibbler's mouth can do some damage during the rest of the day. Having some water will help rinse away most of those harmful little tooth destroyers. I recommend giving your toddler a sippy cup of water in the morning and in the afternoon. Not only is drinking water a great habit for preventing tooth decay, but the health benefits of drinking water throughout the day will have lasting positive effects in all aspects of your toddlers development.
4. Sing a fun song or rhyme while you brush.
Getting your toddler to spend an appropriate length of time scrubbing his chompers can be very difficult. A great trick to help extend the time he spends brushing his teeth is to sing a little song or recite a rhyme while he brushes. Having a nice rhythm to brush to helps your toddler grasp the concept of repeated up and down/back and forth brushing. Also, knowing that the song comes to an end will help you little brush man anticipate how long he should brush. Time is still a slippery concept, and after 10 seconds your little fella might feel like he's been at it for hours, but a song or rhyme will keep him going for a few more minutes.
5. Give your toddler a turn.
To make sure your toddlers teeth get sufficiently clean, you should take the first turn with the toothbrush. A quick once-over from you will get the best results, but then turn over the tooth brush to your little chicklet so she can both imitate the example you just set and gain a feeling of personal pride in her ability to brush her teeth by herself. Doing the brushing at the beginning, rather than after your toddler has had a try at it, will help avoid your little bubbie from feeling like she has done something wrong and is being corrected while giving her a good example to follow for her own turn. As she gets better at brushing, you can eventually let her take over and do the whole routine herself.
One of the best ways to save money as your children get older is to eliminate expensive dental bills, and this starts with good oral hygiene habits. Teaching your little sugar-fiend how to care for his teeth early will instill a great sense of awareness that can have lasting positive effects. Remember to talk to your dentist for the latest information on childhood tooth care and to schedule regular checkups for your little snuggle bug. If you have found these tips helpful, please forward them to all the parents of toddlers that you know. Questions, comments and suggestions are always welcome. Happy parenting!
Showing posts with label hygiene. Show all posts
Showing posts with label hygiene. Show all posts
Monday, August 17, 2009
Friday, May 22, 2009
5 tips for effective use of cloth diapers.
Alright, yesterday I wrote about disposable diapers, so in the interest of being fair and P.C. Today I want to write about cloth diapers! Many of the positions I have worked in as a Nanny and as a child care professional have required that I be familiar with the cloth diaper and it's benefits. What my employers didn't always know was that in the 80's my mother practiced cloth diapering with my siblings, and as the oldest daughter of 10 siblings, I had my fair share of first hand exposure to the topic. I have quite a few tips and tricks to pass on to new mothers who choose cloth diapering. First of all, let me say, I admire you. I respect your choice, and I hope that my tips can help make it an easier one for you. Now for the tips...
1. Know the fold.
There is a certain fold that is the best for cloth diapering. Most cloth diapering sites will show you how it is done, but let me describe it loosely here. Lay the diaper flat with the thick part running from your left hand to your right hand horizontally. With your right hand fold in the thinner corners of the cloth diaper so that they overlap in the middle on the right side, making the diaper look like a blunted arrow with the wide end on your left and the blunt but pointier end on the right. Now take about 1 inch of the diapers edge on each of the 2 ends and fold them in towards one another. This is the diaper fold that will be best for preventing leaks for you and your baby. The large end goes across your babies behind, and the blunted point goes just under your babies belly button.
2. Change often.
One of the basic drawbacks of the cloth diaper is that they cannot hold very much liquid before they need to be changed. They do breath better than any other kind of diaper, but if you don't remove every wet diaper immediately, they will start to chafe your baby's bottom, and that chaffing is hard to get rid of. So do a load of diapers every night, or have the diaper service pick up the diapers as often as the y will, and be liberal with the changing of the nappy.
3. Baking soda satchel between diaper and cover.
This is a little trick that my grandmother used. she took a small cotton sack and filled it half way with baking soda, and slipped it in between the cover (in those days a cover was a heavy plastic thing with tight elastic at the legs) and the cloth diaper. It worked wonders for absorbing smells, and didn't run the risk of caking onto the baby's bottom or irritating the skin. If you have a sewing machine you can turn one of these out pretty quick.
4. Double up for over-nights.
Changing often is all fine and good until you try to get your baby to sleep through the night. Doubling the cloth diaper is the usual remedy for lasting 6 to 8 hours. However, I have a trick, (surprised?) Take some batting, used for padding quilts, and sew a strip of it to the underside of a regular cloth diaper's thicker inner strip, covered with a bit of breathable cotton. Next time you diaper your baby for the night still use two diapers, but have the batting sandwiched between the two. This will capture overflows just long enough to let them absorb into one of the diapers instead of running out the leg opening. If you still experience leaks you can flip the reinforced diaper over so the batting will start to slow the flow of fluid faster, but there is an increased risk of diaper rash.
5. Keep burp-cloths and diapers separate.
Never confuse the nappy's that you are using for your baby's behind, and those that you may use for your baby's face. Though there is very little chance that bacteria would survive washing and be able to cause your baby an eye infection or worse, there is still that small chance. Not to mention the chance that the sugars in your baby's spit up could VERY easily survive washing to give your baby a yeast infection. Simply devise a system (putting a small mark by a permanent marker in the corner of the diapers meant for the baby behind) that you can maintain simply and easily.
Over all, there is not that huge a difference between changing one diaper or another. The challenges you will face with cloth diapering will without question be worth the returns, and with a few tricky tips up your sleeve, those challenges might prove to be nothing more than a momentary distraction from the overall joy of being a mother. If you find these tips helpful, please pass them on to any new mothers or soon-to-be mothers that you might know. I relish questions and comments, so please don't hesitate to leave it if you have one. Happy parenting!
1. Know the fold.
There is a certain fold that is the best for cloth diapering. Most cloth diapering sites will show you how it is done, but let me describe it loosely here. Lay the diaper flat with the thick part running from your left hand to your right hand horizontally. With your right hand fold in the thinner corners of the cloth diaper so that they overlap in the middle on the right side, making the diaper look like a blunted arrow with the wide end on your left and the blunt but pointier end on the right. Now take about 1 inch of the diapers edge on each of the 2 ends and fold them in towards one another. This is the diaper fold that will be best for preventing leaks for you and your baby. The large end goes across your babies behind, and the blunted point goes just under your babies belly button.
2. Change often.
One of the basic drawbacks of the cloth diaper is that they cannot hold very much liquid before they need to be changed. They do breath better than any other kind of diaper, but if you don't remove every wet diaper immediately, they will start to chafe your baby's bottom, and that chaffing is hard to get rid of. So do a load of diapers every night, or have the diaper service pick up the diapers as often as the y will, and be liberal with the changing of the nappy.
3. Baking soda satchel between diaper and cover.
This is a little trick that my grandmother used. she took a small cotton sack and filled it half way with baking soda, and slipped it in between the cover (in those days a cover was a heavy plastic thing with tight elastic at the legs) and the cloth diaper. It worked wonders for absorbing smells, and didn't run the risk of caking onto the baby's bottom or irritating the skin. If you have a sewing machine you can turn one of these out pretty quick.
4. Double up for over-nights.
Changing often is all fine and good until you try to get your baby to sleep through the night. Doubling the cloth diaper is the usual remedy for lasting 6 to 8 hours. However, I have a trick, (surprised?) Take some batting, used for padding quilts, and sew a strip of it to the underside of a regular cloth diaper's thicker inner strip, covered with a bit of breathable cotton. Next time you diaper your baby for the night still use two diapers, but have the batting sandwiched between the two. This will capture overflows just long enough to let them absorb into one of the diapers instead of running out the leg opening. If you still experience leaks you can flip the reinforced diaper over so the batting will start to slow the flow of fluid faster, but there is an increased risk of diaper rash.
5. Keep burp-cloths and diapers separate.
Never confuse the nappy's that you are using for your baby's behind, and those that you may use for your baby's face. Though there is very little chance that bacteria would survive washing and be able to cause your baby an eye infection or worse, there is still that small chance. Not to mention the chance that the sugars in your baby's spit up could VERY easily survive washing to give your baby a yeast infection. Simply devise a system (putting a small mark by a permanent marker in the corner of the diapers meant for the baby behind) that you can maintain simply and easily.
Over all, there is not that huge a difference between changing one diaper or another. The challenges you will face with cloth diapering will without question be worth the returns, and with a few tricky tips up your sleeve, those challenges might prove to be nothing more than a momentary distraction from the overall joy of being a mother. If you find these tips helpful, please pass them on to any new mothers or soon-to-be mothers that you might know. I relish questions and comments, so please don't hesitate to leave it if you have one. Happy parenting!
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