Smiles For Kids Blog

Originally Posted: July 5, 2010 - By: Dr. Lindhorst
Summer 2010 is here and it is HOT here in Houston!!! We had a fun spring at Smiles For Kids and we are really enjoying the summer since as always it is busy, busy, busy. In the spring we did lots of new fun things… We hired a new wonderful hygienist since Rae decided she needed to take a break from working with kids and moved on to a general dental office. We will miss her dearly and we wish her luck in her new endeavors. Meantime we found Michele!!! Oh my goodness she is great! She recently graduated from the dental hygiene program and is as eager, innovative and fun as you can get. She loves working with kids and she is really, really good at it. If you have not met her yet, you will soon and I guarantee you will love her.

Around the same time we had a change in our front desk staff. Jessica left our practice, but we got Lindsay as an incredible reward! Lindsay has had few years of experience working in a pediatric dental office and she is very knowledgeable on insurance issues, treatment plans and any other questions you might have about technical and financial topics. She is cheerful and full of energy and I think you will find her very helpful when you call or when you come for your next appointment.

Everybody else is doing GREAT! Our back staff is having fun with few new things we have incorporated into our daily routines. One of the greatest things you will find our office using is ORAVERSE. Check it out here. It is the only medicine that reverses oral anesthesia and numbness of your mouth. It is a rather incredible drug that allows you to be able to eat, chew and speak normally very soon after a dental procedure. We are very excited about having it incorporated into our practice and we will be happy to answer any questions connected with it.
We are also now connected to Facebook. Please join us there to hear the latest updates and daily adventures of Smiles For Kids. You can keep up with us and all our new discoveries that way.

One more exciting piece of information is that we are looking into moving our office into a bit more comfortable, modern and accommodating space! I will not tell the secrets yet as nothing has been signed, but… we are moving just a mile or so away, right on the feeder of I-10 to an office that is about twice the size of what we have now. We are in final stages of planning and financing our new project and we will let everyone know as soon as it is in motion where and when we are moving! So for now, please keep your fingers crossed and think of us as we are moving through this grueling procedure.
As for other news from this spring… as always my husband and I with my dad in tow have done a few runs, a bike rides and a few trips :) So here is what my wonderful family has been up to. First of all I did my first full marathon in Dallas right before Christmas time. My dad has a goal of running all 4 major Texas marathons and this was another one he checked off his list. 26.2 miles of fun and games! I must say it wasn’t too bad and I enjoyed training for it with my dad and my wonderful husband. We did lots and lots of runs in the urban Houston area, but we also ran in some state parks such as Brazos Bend to train for this big day. Everyone did great!

Then we ran the Houston ½ marathon in January and finally we switched to biking in preparation for the MS-150 in April. This year the weather held up for us although we had many threats of rain and storms and it rained ALL NIGHT as we were sleeping in the tent at La Grange. But the road was clear although a bit wet and it stayed cool thanks to the overcast sky. My mom and her friend and our cute little boys met us in Austin to cheer for us and to bring us back home. Then in May we took a trip to Switzerland with the boys. We have friends who live there and they prepared a very neat tour of the Swiss Alps for us. We stayed in a little “village” called Beatenberg and hiked the beautiful mountains, rode many trains, buses, and funiculars and even took a boat ride on one of the two lovely lakes we could see in the valley below our home in the mountains. The weather was rather ugly with lots and lots of clouds and it rained or snowed every day.

BUT we managed to have a great time anyway and both Christoph and Luki did a great job hiking and hiking. Few weeks later we went to Chicago for the annual AAPD conference. At first I wasn’t too excited about Chicago, but boy was I wrong! What a great city! It was hard to stay in class when the weather was lovely and the city was calling. But I did !!! I took some great classes on pediatric oral pathology, new findings in pediatric oral pharmacology, esthetic restorations of anterior teeth and what they call “mini-clinics” which are many short presentations on various topics in pediatric dentistry. But I also got to hike the downtown of Chicago, see views of the city from Hancock Center as well as from Willis tower (former Sears tower), admire the architecture of Chicago from an architectural boat tour, hang out at Navy Pier and play in the Centennial Park. And to top off the great trip I also was able to catch up with many of my friends from pediatric dental residency that live now all over the country.

Of course we ate at Gino’s East, which has at least an hour wait of just standing in line outside but the pizza is worth every second of it! I’m a convert of Chicago and will recommend it to anyone who wants to visit. Especially if you are going in the beautiful spring time! And now here we are… busy in the summer time in our office. We are enjoying all of our patients and waiting for our college kids to hear their stories! We have had a few new high school graduates excited about their new college life coming up and we share their excitement and congratulate them from the bottom of our hearts! Enjoy your summer dear patients and parents and we want to hear from you soon! And Happy 4th of July!