You're Never Fully Dressed Without a Smile

*This is a review post sponsored by Influenster.com. I was given a free trial-size package to try and review. I received no monetary compensation and all opinions are my own.

Smiling is very important in my job. Teachers need to be excited, we need to be warm, we need to be friendly. It is better to positively reinforce good behavior than yell and lecture at misbehavior. We also get up close and personal with our students, especially because we all have 25 or less in our class (remember my smallest is 6 and largest is 21). 

Due to the fact that many of our teachers are commuters (like me), get to school early, and rush to eat lunch so we can get back to work. At any point in time, I can walk into the bathroom and see a teacher brushing their teeth.

Personally, I love smiling while I teach. I get so excited about my lessons and so involved. Seriously, I should upload a video of me teaching one day. I'm bouncing all around, I'm flailing arms, imitating voices, using crazy slang, weaving through the desks, and smiling. Always a big smile. I love my smile. Just look how often I do it!

 As a kid, I had a small mouth for my big teeth and had to have 3 years of braces, then continue a retainer for another 5 years. So, when I was given my first VoxBox ever by Influenster.com, I was very excited!

I was given the new Colgate SlimSoft toothbrush, as well as some toothpaste and mouthwash.

I started using these products right away. What really interested me is that the toothbrush itself. The bristles are 17x smaller which means there is 35% more bristles with 6x deeper reach across the gums and 1.5x deeper between the teeth. When I first used it, I could immediately feel the deeper reach. I remember my dentist mentioning that the best way to clean your teeth and keep them healthy is to angle the bristles toward the gum line and brush in small circles. I could really feel those tiny bristles working together to clean my mouth better.

This toothbrush, in tandem with the Colgate total toothpaste (which I still prefer Crest with Scope) definitely made my mouth feel cleaner day-to-day. Even after all I ate, my mouth still felt cleaner and more scrubbed than with my old toothbrush. They also gave me a trial size Colgate peppermint mouthwash (it was very sweet flavored!). This combination gave me the clean, sterile feel of visiting the dentist every single day! How amazing! What confidence I've had smiling because I feel I've gotten a professional cleaning every single day!

The only problem I had with the SlimSoft toothbrush is the fact that its bristles are so tiny and soft. I still have a permanent brace along the back of my bottom front teeth (from canine to canine). Food gets stuck in their all the time, like popcorn kernals, seeds, apple skins, etc. I typically use my toothbrush to get those pieces of food out. But, this toothbrush was too soft to do that. I had to actually use floss to get it out.

But, all in all, I'd give the Colgate SlimSoft toothbrush an 8.5/10! You should definitely try to get one!