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Monday, June 30, 2008

Birthdays and Dental Woes

On Saturday we went to Mission Bay for a birthday party. It was a lot of fun. I got permission from everyone to be able to take pictures and the kids had a blast playing games and eating yummy food. Definitely a successful 2-year birthday party, until....

After we'd been there a while, Buddha decided to catapult himself, mouth first, into a step-up on the playground. He knocked one of his front teeth way off course and we spent the following four hours driving from dentist to dentist and getting his teeth fixed. My three year old now has braces. Okay, not really braces, they call it a splint, but it looks like braces. Basically his one good tooth is holding his other bad tooth forward.

The whole ordeal was just that - an ordeal. Poor Buddha wouldn't let the first dentist even look inside his mouth. So he referred us to a Pedodontist who was on call in another part of town. I liked this lady. She was very nice. But I was sort of wishing that she would take my cue and follow my lead in order to calm Buddha down and ease his mind about the whole dentist thing. Instead, she just kept yakking away at him, talking over him, being loud, etc. I'm sure it works with some children, but that's not my MO with my kids. Buddha is used to being listened to and having a really soft, soothing environment when he's stressed out. So, he wouldn't let her look either, and she didn't have an assistant with her, so she was unwilling to sedate him. Our only other option was to strap him into a Papoose. It was really sad. There he lay on the table, struggling against the straps holding his wrists to his side, his feet were all wrapped together and his arms were secured with another section of the wrap. He was in a little cocoon and he was not liking it at all. I was fine watching all this because I knew there would really be no other way to fix Buddha's tooth. She sidled up to him, tucked his head against her chest and proceeded to apply a topical anesthesia, shoot some numbing solution into his gums, and pull his tooth forward again. He screamed the entire time. We finished and were almost out the door with a panting, despondent Buddha when we noticed that his teeth closed right on top of each other (in the front) so we had to turn around and start all over again. Argh! This time she applied the splint to hold that tooth forward. We drove to get Buddha a milkshake, but he fell asleep on the way home and drank it later when he woke up. Tylenol has been our dear friend through all this and now Buddha seems to be doing just fine. I kind of miss Buddha's straight (but very separate) toothy grin. Now he'll have a very separate and crooked grin - at least until he's six or seven. :)

Incidentally, with Buddha's first dental x-rays being taken during this episode, we discovered that Buddha has inherited his Grandpa Bagel's missing teeth phenomenon. You'll notice in the picture of Buddha's teeth below that on one side of his mouth, he doesn't have a tooth between his front tooth and his canine like on the other side. He doesn't even have the adult tooth that would follow the baby tooth down. Interesting.

We played some games like "Pin Your Face on Buzz Lightyear," and...

..."Buzz, Buzz, Zurg."

"Hail, hail the gang's all here!"

Here's the birthday boy testing the finger foods.


Addy

The birthday family.

Ellie-girl. I love this little lady's head of curls and her bright blue eyes!


Here's Rett, the birthday boy, sampling some juice.

Brothers do everything together. :)

Chubby little Jayden.

The Chief and Jacoby talking about some male topic or other...race cars maybe.

This has to be my favorite picture of the day. Ryan and Megan. So darling!

Jacoby and Heather - the birthday parents.

Bugga Man is such a goob. I love him for it, though.


Blowing out the candle - or the match really, since the candle didn't want to light in the breeze.

Heather and Agnes.

Ellie and Coby attacking their cake.

Mmm...frosting. Who can turn down frosting?

Rett and his mommy.

Libby - she's the one responsible for the two beautiful blonde girls. :)

Jeffrey has the greatest big, brown eyes!

Ah, and here we come to the infamous smashed mouth. He looks pretty happy here, eh?
Yeah, this was before the Papoose. :)

18 comments:

lindsey. said...

Oh my goodness - what an eventful weekend! My brother once fell while ice skating and broke off half of one of his front teeth. He pocketed the tooth, my mom took him to the dentist (in a panic as this event occurred after my parents had invested thousands in his charming smile) and the dentist literally glued his tooth back together. It was supposed to be a temporary fix but that was about eight years ago and the tooth is still attached! :) KIDS!!!!

Heather said...

Liz!!! It makes my insides hurt everytime I think about poor Soren and his tooth ordeal. I hope things go well at the check-up today. I want some of these cute pictures! You are such a good photographer:)

Erin said...

oh -- yuck. so sorry, liz! but very cute pictures!

Freckles said...

Wow, how did you not completely freak out?! I would've been hysterical, I can't handle owies very well! I hope nothing too crazy ever happens to my kids or they might bleed to death with me passed out on the floor!

On a lighter note...great pictures!! Looks like fun until the incident.

Megan said...

UH-MAZING!!! (the pictures) So sad for Soren... I'm so glad you were able to find someone to help him... poor little guy.

Melissa said...

Wow what an ordeal!! That is crazy- a papoose?? What in the world? Oh poor guy. Love the shots of the party- you are so good, I can never say it enough and I'm not going to stop saying it. The shots are all fabulous even the smashed-mouth one. Ouch.

Liz said...

I will get you copies of those when I come back, Heather! I'm glad you like them. It was so fun!

Thanks for the compliments on my photography everyone! I'm working on it and I think it's definitely getting better. But I still have lots to learn, too!

Jacqui said...

OUCH, Soren!!! That's no fun! I'm so sorry you guys had to deal with all that. But I do love the picture of Soren at the end, smiling away. All the other pictures are awesome too ... The one of "Addy" is beautiful! Great work!

Brooklet said...

Ouch, poor Soren. That does not look like it felt very good. Especially the papoose part- it breaks my heart to think of him panicking and scared, all strapped up! But at least his teeth are back on their way to being fixed.

The pictures are lovely, I especially like the one of the little blonde girl- very cute!

Wendy said...

Yikes Soren! That's crazy!

Loving all of your new posts and pictures!

Marcia said...

okay, that's enough emergencies for this year - poor little fellow - I hope he can still enjoy the reunion - can't wait to see you all.

Unknown said...

Oh my!!! I'm so sorry about your "ordeal" Hope his tooth is fixed real soon.
Cute pictures!

Amy D. Hall Riter said...

Your pictures are great!!!
Can you send me your home address when you get a chance

hallamy@hotmail.com

Thanks!

Miriam Herm said...

Oh my gosh! What a day! Poor everyone involved (especially Soren). I took Ava to get some shots and at first they wouldn't let me hold her because I was pregnant and they were afraid I'd get hurt or not be able to hold her well, so they held her down. It was so awful, that I insisted I hold her (which went much better). But I just couldn't stand seeing her sad little face looking straight at me and her hands trying to reach out for me to save her.

So, in short, I can't believe you had to go through the "cocoon" with Soren. Poor you (even though you said it was fine).

The pictures look awesome!

Scott and Karin said...

OW! Poor kid! As to the bedroom sharing...it's going really well. The biggest problem is that they get each other wound up at night and sometimes they won't fall asleep until 9:30 or 10, and we put them down between 8 and 8:30. They just love to play with each other! Then Annicka has a tendancy to wake up Park in the morning. She wakes up around 7 or 7:30 and Park used to sleep an hour later than that, but not so anymore. They really do love sharing a room though.

Marilee said...

I can't even imagine having to take Megan to the dentist - she would have reacted the exact same way. I'm so glad that it's over and hope you guys don't have any more emergencies!

Lisa said...

I feel so bad for Soren. It sounds like it was a horrible experience for him. I hope he isn't permanently scared of the dentist. Parker is and he has never been. I heard him saying one day I'm going to send you to the dentist. He used it as a threat. I finally figured out why he said that. He thinks the dentist is a horrible place after watching finding Nemo. I really laughed about that one.

Lisa/Scott said...

Poor little guy! Sorry the Dentist was a bad experience. I can only imagine with them strapping him in there. I can't believe they didn't just make him sleep through it, or at least put him on the laughing gas. Poor sweet boy! Has he ever been to the Dentist before this? Hopefully he has so that he knows that not all dental experiences are bad ones.