Thursday, August 12, 2010

pulling the plug on the paci

I'm full of dread over this. We should have really done it long ago -- before she was super attached, before she had it so long that it started giving her an overbite, before she could remember that her mean mommy took away her most favorite thing in the world. Alas, we did not, so here we are.

We've determined tomorrow night is go time. We'll both be around all weekend, so I can spend as much time comforting her / helping her sleep as I need to. Dan will have to help with overnights, as miss Audrey is still waking up every few hours. Everyone tells me she'll have a few bad nights and naptimes and then it'll be a thing of the past.

I've been talking up the paci fairy, the idea of her sending her pacis to babies who don't have any, and telling her what a big girl she is, but I think it's still going to seriously suck. I've offered her a trip to the toy store to pick out something new -- anything she wants, even -- but I'm not sure she gets the concept. Last week, I told her that she could have M+Ms if she went on the big girl potty. She walked in, sat on the potty chair for 1.2 seconds, then came over with her hand outstretched, saying, "Mommy, I'm ready for my M+Ms now!" Those two year olds are so darn literal!

Saturday, August 7, 2010

8 months / 2.5 years!

Olivia turned 2.5 and Audrey turned 8 months old today!

Olivia, as she likes to say, is "VERRRRRY busy" lately -- her imagination amazes me. She's always doing things to entertain her baby sis, a favorite being sniffing her toes and then yelling, "P.U.!" Such a lady. ;P

She had another tooth incident during the week that was nearly identical to the one last November: running ---> tripping in kitchen ---> tooth, meet tile floor. She'd just been to the dentist the day before for her 6-month cleaning and was very brave ("I just cried a little bit!"), but her bravery waned slightly in the face of a second visit in a week. She did fine, amusing the whole office by stating that she wanted THREE silly bands AND A DUCK TOO! as her prize at the end. We go back in a couple of weeks to have the previously-restored tooth re-restored. Poor OE.

Audrey has been having a big couple of weeks: learning to sit up on her own, working on honing her crawling skills, showing the first signs of her two bottom teeth peeking through (finally!), saying dada and mama, and just today, pulling herself to standing while holding onto a toy. I wish I'd been quick enough with the camera, because the look on her face as she stood there was something like, "Hey wow look at this cool thing I did hey mom look I'm standing up OH MY GOD HOW DID I GET LIKE THIS AND HOW DO I GET DOWN?!"

We went to a picnic for families of kids with hearing loss today, and everyone was absolutely gaga over her tiny pink hearing aid. Some of the older kids who had hearing aids themselves came over to see it, and it was really great to see these kids, some of them with profound loss in both ears, even, doing just fine. She starts speech therapy next week, which I'm really excited about!