Pearly Whites

Tate is coming up on his third birthday and I thought maybe it would be a good idea to get him into the dentist. Just to make sure the teeth were okay. I was a little nervous about making the appointment for a couple reasons. 1) Wasn't too sure how Tate would react to being at the dentist. I was thinking he would probably hate it. 2) I thought for sure the dentist would tell me Tate has a million cavities because it is impossible to brush his teeth. He wants to do it and only him, no help from the mom! The dentist's office called this morning and there was a cancellation this afternoon. I thought, better just do it. I tried to prep Tate for the fun time we would have at the dentist. . . they're going to just check your teeth and make sure they are good, strong teeth; and you get to go in this really cool chair that moves, etc. etc. When it was our turn to go back, the assistant was awesome. He gave Tate five and started showing him all the cool equipment and what it did. So much for my uptalking the dentist:) These gadgets were way more fun then what I was telling him. Tate was totally into it and got to make the brush spin, the sucker work, and squirt water. The assistant totally won Tate over. Tate also got to work the chair, then jumped right up! Tate just sat there like a champ opening and closing his mouth when he was supposed to. I sat in awe of how great Tate was doing. I figured I better get this on record (pulled out my phone for a quick pic), because who knows how the next visit will go (certainly can't get best behavior two times in a row). Tate checked out the electric toothbrush while waiting for the dentist to come check him out too. For the dentist, Tate got the chair to lay all the way back and the big light pointed in his mouth. The dentist and the assistant said his teeth look great (huge sigh of relief on my part) and that he was better behaved then some of the five and six year olds they get in. I was so impressed with how well they handled a 2 1/2 year old patient!
And for being the star patient of the day--Tate got to pick out a toy on the way out. After much deliberating on just which toy he wanted (the frisbee, giraffe hat, football), he settled on the cowboy hat. A new toothbrush and a cowboy hat--Tate will want to go back to the dentist everyday with prizes like those!