In Which Connor Gets His Teeth Cleaned, And Feeds A Goat

Wow, what a busy day!

First I'll tell you about the not-so-fun part.  Connor had his dentist appointment early this morning; because of his genetic condition we see the pediatric dentist every six months.  Connor has a number of issues with his teeth and palate-- he has, among other things, microdontia (his teeth are too small), very widely spaced teeth, an extremely high arched palate, and the big one: amelogenesis imperfecta of the primary maxillary central incisors.  Basically what this means is that the enamel of Connor's two front teeth didn't develop properly.  Those teeth are shaped differently than typical incisors (they're much, much smaller and look like they have a couple of chunks taken out of them) and are a different color than typical teeth: kind of a carrot orange.  They are also really temperature sensitive, which explains why Connor hates ice cream.  Because the enamel on those teeth is extremely weak, we have to have them painted with fluoride every six months to strengthen them.  So that was the plan today.

The dentist took a quick look at Connor's teeth; thankfully since they are so widely spaced and small (and also because he doesn't chew anything) he didn't need any sort of major cleaning.  So she just painted his teeth, which was an ordeal in itself.  The poor little guy ended up with a couple of "rug burns" on his face because he kept trying to jerk around while the dentist had her hands in his mouth, and despite her being very quick he was in tears by the time the painting was over. 

At least he got a balloon out of the deal.

So on to the fun part of the day!  We went straight from the dentist appointment to the playground, where Connor got to go on the slide multiple times and also get pushed on the swings; a pair of activities that banished all of those tears immediately!  Then we headed to the library, where we picked up a big box of farm animal books and activities for the week.  And to kick everything off with a bang, we drove straight from the library to the farm!

We had a friend graciously offer us the run of her place as an educational experience (and she fed us lunch, to boot!) The main attraction was the goat barn, where a pair of kids was waiting to be bottle-fed, but when we got to the barn we discovered a special surprise; it turns out there were four kids instead of two!  One of the does had her babies just before we arrived-- they were probably less than an hour old when we got the chance to see them.  Talk about cute!

Connor was pretty enamored with the goats, and the baby goats liked him quite a bit too.  Or at least they liked his pants, which might have had some formula spilled on them earlier in the day.  The little brown goat kept trying to suckle off of them, which made Connor a little bit nervous, as you might imagine.  That's why the first picture on here is all blurry-- Connor is gyrating wildly as the goat tries to hold on to his pants.  It made picture taking a bit hard!

But we got things sorted out soon enough, and while he didn't want to hold the bottle Connor did gently pet the babies, which was great!  Then we upped the ante and stuck him in the hay feeder.  The goats weren't quite sure what to make of him, and he wasn't really thrilled with the idea either, but hey, it was good sensory work!  After that it was time for a break, and we sat and watched a couple of goats getting milked.  Then finally Connor got to pet one of the does who was waiting to be milked-- he even got to touch her udder! 

So the day ended extremely well, and it was fantastic for me to get the chance to catch up with an awesome friend while Connor had a learning experience.

And did I mention there were baby goats?  How could we possibly go wrong?

~Jess