Monday, July 28, 2008

Pacifiers Anonymous

Last week a short article about kids not using pacifiers after age 2 appeared in my mail pile at home. I think someone is trying to tell me something. No one fessed up. Not that I was offended - I've been talking about taking them away for 6 months now.

Ben is out of town this week and suggested I take them away while he's gone. I guess he doesn't want to hear the cries of "paci, paci!" I guess he doesn't want to see our near-perfect schedule of naps and bedtime thrown out the window. I guess he doesn't want to be the bad guy.



I think I'm almost ready to be the bad guy. Almost. Just trying to psyche myself up.

P.S. Don't even get me started on how they need to move to big kid beds and be potty trained too. Now that they are two I feel like we need to enter "big kid" world. Can't they be babies a little longer?

8 comments:

Unknown said...

LOL. I guess I'm fortunate Ari never liked them, so I didn't have to worry about breaking the habit.

I don't have any advice to offer, except that I saw an episode of the Nanny (yes, I admit, I watch some of those shows every now and then...) where they did a whole "Paci-Fairy" thing to get some kids to give them up.

Basically, she told this toddler that since he was a big boy now, it was time to give his pacifiers away to other little girls and boys that needed them, and the pacifier fairy would give him a big surprise (I guess a more helpful version of the tooth fairy I heard about growing up?).

The family made a big deal out of putting all the pacifiers in a big colorful envelope, addressing it to the pacifier fairy, and putting it in the mailbox.

The kid got up the next morning and couldn't wait to check the mailbox, where he found a big envelope with his name on it.

The envelope had a bunch of confetti and some new little "big boy" toys in it. Afterward, the kid seemed pretty proud of himself for the milestone and "helping all of those other little boys and girls" and happy to get a surprise.

No idea how well it works in real life, but it seemed like a fun and non-threatening project on the show. ;)

Whatever you do, good luck!

Vicki said...

i guess i am lucky (if you really want to call it that) that my son didn't really care for them. we didn't even have to worry about getting rid of bottles and sippy cups. He is such a pig that as long as he had food he didn't really care where it came from. =o/

I have heard about the "paci-fairy" but with bottles. I don't see why it wouldn't work.

I'm with you though....why can't they just be babies a little longer?

We are getting ready to start the potty training, which means we will have to get him into a big boy bed soon. =o(

Tiffani said...

lol. Good luck. Neither one of my kids would take the pacifier either. But both flipped out when we took the bottles away. We just threw them all away one day. Then we were not tempted to give in. It took 4 days of screaming tantrums then all was right with the world again. lol.
I waited on the potty training as long as i could. lol. Both my kids were 3 before they were potty trained. lol. Good luck on that too.

Ellie said...

Oh the woes of a mother! I just looked at that pic of them and I had to think was that anna and adam? I totally thought it was...and then I realized that your kiddos are just getting so big! Good luck!

Casey Angulo said...

When I took Caleb's away it was surprisingly not that bad. It was only a couple days of him asking for it. (But he was three.) We didn't do anything cutesy just cold turkey. I do wish I had gotten rid of it sooner though because it changed his bite.

Sabby said...

What really hurts for them to have the paci? They ARE still babies!

Unknown said...

So? How did the week go? :)

Allison said...

I haven't done it yet!! Isn't that horrible? We had a tough couple of days and I just couldn't add the pacifiers into that.

I think we are doing it tonight though. We are going to collect all of the pacifiers and put them in a bag. We'll put the bag on the porch and wait for the pacifier fairy to replace it with some cute new pillows for their beds (they've never had pillows to sleep with yet) and a little toy.

Hope it works, but I'm still expecting a few days of crying at nap and bedtime.