It all started the day the crawling began. My cute little chubby cheeked baby picked up his arms and stated crawling towards me and I saw it... his brand new tooth.


The same day! Crawling and teeth. He was SOOO excited to be moving that he was grinning literally from ear to ear. And there was that little nub of a first tooth poking through.

Thus began a ritual that I quickly started to hate...

the brushing of that tooth.

Ash hated it. I'd have to hold him down and brush as fast as I could. As he got bigger, the harder it became to hold him down. I resolved to make this better somehow. I tried an electric toothbrush, fancy pastes, and stickers. None worked.

One day I got an idea to try straight up modern day bribery... MONEY. It worked! I bought a see-thru piggy bank, so he could see the money growing. He really wanted a beta fish like the one in his class at daycare... named Nimbi. We agreed that when he got enough money he could buy a fish.

Every night we would remind him... no crying and let us brush good and you get money for a fish. Most nights he would do a good job and get a few coins. Some nights he would struggle a little and get only one or two coins. And every once in a while he would forget and we would have to hold him down... but after getting no coins that day he would always go back to letting us do it.

After a few months the piggy bank started to get full. We cashed the money in and gave him the dollar bills. We made a special trip to the pet store and picked out a fish and tank. Ash walked up to the counter. Before we could even give the cashier the fish, Ash had stuck his little hand, full of cash, up on the counter and plopped down all his money. He was so excited to buy it with his OWN money!


Tom tried to name the fish "Doug," but it wouldn't stick. Ash just kept calling him "my Nimbi."


Ash always feeds the fish (sometimes just a little too much...) and now he is brushing his teeth to work for more fish food.

(Cause he's the fish's daddy and has to take good care of him!)