Note: I participated in this sponsored campaign on behalf of Firefly®, REACH®, and One2One Network. All opinions stated are my own.
I can still remember a time I lied to my Dad. It was a flat-out bold-faced lie. And it was (as all lies are) pointless. I was spending the night at his new apartment and he asked me if I had brushed my teeth. I told him I had.
I had not.
And he found out.
It wasn’t hard. He walked into the bathroom and checked to see if my toothbrush was wet.
It wasn’t.
I can’t really remember the consequence for lying to him other than having to actually brush my teeth. Not so bad.
But the lasting impact of that lie is obvious to me. And it was an indication to me that tooth brushing was a habit I didn’t really care for.
I am trying to make sure our kids don’t dislike tooth-brushing as much as I did. So we are starting early with the habit. And so far, they are the ones who remind us to do this daily habit!
I have found that if I want to start a habit in our home (for myself or my kids), I need to get organized to make it happen. I think of it as organizing with purpose.
And since we are trying to create the healthy habit of tooth-brushing with our kids, I came up with a super simple way to organize their oral hygiene supplies to encourage them to keep up the habit.
For kids, organization systems need to be as simple as possible. And our new tooth-brushing organizer is SUPER simple.
Here’s what I did:
Supplies:
- the lid to a simple storage bin from Target.
- a set of three storage cups (I found them on the same aisle at Target).
- Firefly toothbrushes with integrated stoplight timer
- Firefly Spiderman mouthwash
- kids’ toothpaste
- kids’ flossers
Putting together a system:
I used the lid of the storage bin as a sort of tray for the supplies. Then I gave each of my girls a cup of their own for their toothbrush and toothpaste. I added the third cup and filled it with flossers the girls love to use. I completed the tooth brushing encouraging organization system by adding the Firefly Spiderman mouthwash (my daughter absolutely loves Spiderman).
Using the system with preschool kids:
We have lots of little things we do to try to encourage our girls to brush, floss, and rinse each night before bed. They are SO FUN that the girls acutally ask to brush their teeth! Here are a few of our tips.
- Name tooth-brushing something fun. When our girls were really young and we were establishing the habit of tooth-brushing, we called it time to “tickle their teeth.”
- Use a fun timer. The toothbrushes these days are so helpful for developing the habit of tooth-brushing. Kids can understand from a really early age the green light, yellow light, and red light system. So the Firefly toothbrushes are great for encouraging kids to brush long enough to actually get their teeth clean! We also got a super fun Star Wars lightsaber toothbrush in a fun kit from Firefly and Reach for our family. (Go to Facebook and enter to win some for your family!)
- Incorporate counting into the process wherever possible. Our preschool girls love to practice counting. When it comes to using the Firefly mouthwash we got, they love counting to 30 and swishing it around their mouths until it is time to spit – and hey: how fun is spitting?!?! We also count their teeth as we floss at night to make sure we don’t miss any!
- Do it in the dark! Things that glow-in-the-dark are almost irresistible to kids! The Firefly toothbrushes we got for our kids light up while you are using them, so they are perfect for making a fun tooth-brushing experience in the dark!
- Do it with them! There is nothing like a good family tooth-brushing session. And since we are modeling good behaviors to our kids, this is just another good habit we can show them by example. We got a set of toothbrushes for adults in our kit, too; so it was fun to brush our teeth with them with our soft-bristled toothbrushes from REACH.
My hope for our new tooth-brushing system is that our kids create a lifelong habit of good oral hygiene so that as we give them more and more freedom to take care of themselves without our supervision, they won’t feel the need to lie about brushing their teeth, like I did to my Dad. They will actually enjoy it and see the benefit of taking care of their teeth.
More about the Firefly and REACH products our family received.
We got a big package with these items:
- Firefly Spiderman Flouride Rinse – this comes with a cup and pump to make the process of rinsing after brushing simple and less messy. My daughter loves to pump the mouthwash into the cup and then have me count with her while she rinses. You can get this rinse at Walmart.
- Firefly Kilo Ren Lightsaber Toothbrush – this toothbrush is SO FUN! It has a built-in timer and lights up for 60 seconds at a time to ensure that each row of teeth gets the proper brushing attention. It also talks and makes the fun lightsaber noise! I like that it also has a cover to make sure it stays clean. You can get them at Walmart and Walgreens.
- REACH Advanced Care toothbrushes – These are so good for sensitive gums because they have a curved design (longer on the outside and shorter on the inside) and soft bristles to remove the plaque at my gum line. You can get them at Walmart and Walgreens.
- REACH UltraClean toothrbushes – I prefer these toothbrushes because they have a built-in tongue cleaner (for fresher breath!). And since we got a 4 pack of these, I can throw one in our travel bags to make sure we ALWAYS have one on hand. You can get them at Walmart and Target.
