Reaghan has officially been pacifier free for 1 whole week!

She has only been allowed to use her paci at nap times and bedtimes for almost a year now, but for some reason we just couldn't get rid of it all together. Some of it was hesitancy on my part. I knew how easily the pacifier helped her fall asleep and I was selfishly worried that she wouldn't nap or sleep as well without it. Obviously as she's gotten older its become more and more obvious that she didn't really need it she was just used to using it.

When Lilly was born I tried to feel her out about getting rid of the paci, saying that now that Lilly was here she might need all the paci's and since she was a big girl she should give her pacifiers to Lilly. She was very matter of fact in that conversation, letting me know that Lilly had her own paci's and she could keep her big girl paci's. She wasn't really getting the whole "big girls don't use pacifiers" thing. Since she didn't jump on board with a positive connection between Lilly and giving up the paci's I decided to wait for a couple months so there wouldn't be any negative associations. Maybe I read too many blog posts and over thought the idea that she might be bitter towards Lilly if she was the reason she had to give up her paci because honestly, Reaghan has shown zero jealousy, bitterness, resentment whatever towards her baby sister. So it probably wouldn't have been that big of a deal, but wait I did. Also, I needed to come to a place where I was getting enough sleep that I could handle any toddler meltdowns in the middle of the night along with the newborn's needs! Once I felt like I could handle it if went horrifically wrong, I started telling her at night during her bed time routine that we were going to have to say goodbye to her paci soon, and then I said in a few days, and then one night I told her that if she gave up her pacifier she would get a special treat. {she sort of loves special treats!} She immediately pulled her paci out of her mouth and handed it to me! haha I told her I didn't have a special treat right then, and that she could sleep with her paci one more night and the next day we would say goodbye to the pacifier and get a special treat. She went to bed really excited about the idea. I went to bed thinking oh man, this is it. We have to go through with it now! This could be my last night of decent(ish) sleep for a while!

The following night at dinner we told her our plan. We said we would put her pacifier in a special bag, take it to the ice cream shop and throw it away and after she threw it away she could get her special ice cream treat! She was so excited! I l.o.v.e when she gets excited about things. When we got there she marched right up to that trashcan, took her paci out of the back and tossed it into the trashcan without a second thought! I was the one that got a little choked up when I saw that pink paci fall into the dark hole. I'm ridiculously sentimental. But you guys! My first baby is growing up!