Big Girl Changes

We decided the Wednesday before Thanksgiving would be "P-Day", as in no more pacifier day. I figured if it went really badly, I would have four days to recover before heading back to work. So Wednesday night, I cut the rubber end off Amelia's paci and gave it to her before bed. First she played with it for awhile, which was highly entertaining. She kept poking her finger in the end of it and holding it up in the air while Andy and I stifled giggles. She finally put it in her mouth, tried to suck on it, and then took it out and looked at me like, "What's this? What's going on here?" She managed to get out, "I want a betta paci." I calmly replied my rehearsed, "That's the only one we have," which I had to repeat several times. She eventually fell asleep without it and it laid in her crib without her even using it...let me stress how earth-shattering this is. For over two years, Amelia has slept with that paci in her mouth ALL NIGHT LONG! So the fact that we survived the first night was astounding. Let's just say on Thanksgiving, we had something to be very thankful about.

Fast forward three days to Saturday...nap time and bed time had been going pretty smoothly (without the paci) until Saturday evening. We had family Christmas pictures, which is not the most fun to undertake with a two year old, but we managed to get a few good ones. As soon as we left, Amelia started crying in the car, saying she wanted to go to bed, which is what she does when she's sick. I think some sort of light switch went off in her the minute we walked out of the studio. We tried to stop at Steak 'N Shake for supper, but ended up having to pack up our food because she wouldn't stop crying. We no sooner pulled into town, that she started throwing up everywhere in the car! This continued all night, along with an all night clean-up (Andy spent 3 hours on the carseat alone!). What a way to spend Saturday night. As with any incidence where her sleep pattern is interrupted like this, Amelia has not slept through the night since. That was 9 days ago. Nine nights of getting up with her throughout the night. Let me just say that this will send any sane, kind person to the loony bin! And is also, by the way, the main reason for me not posting in quite some time.

Soooooooooooo, is it because her sleep pattern is off, or because she doesn't have the paci to calm herself down? I say both, however, I know the paci is probably a big part of it-BUT, she's not asking for it!!! And we are sure as heck not giving it back to her, so I guess we're just going to have to suffer through this no sleep period until she adjusts...which is hopefully soon!

In the meantime, Amelia decided she did not want to wear diapers any more. "I want poo-ups, mommy!" So we've also been working on potty training. We've made huge gains in this area as well. Amelia will go potty everytime we take her-even at daycare. Today she only used 1 pull-up all day-no accidents! So things are looking up...wait, let me back up and explain Amelia's other habit.

About a month ago, Amelia decided that it would be cool to go #2 in her diaper, then get it out and play with it. This first happened in her crib during a nap. Let's not forget that she has a crib tent because she started climbing out when she was 16 months old. Yes, she smears it all over the tent, all over herself, all over her stuffed animals. This "habit" was repeated at least 6 times until one night at 10:30 p.m. when I'm giving her a cold bath and we're trying to get everything cleaned up and put her back to bed (only to realize there was no way we could get it all, so she had to go spend the night at my mom and dad's)...I reached out for help and several people told me to get the footed sleepers, cut the feet off, and put them on her backwards so she is unable to access her diaper when she's in her crib. I must say she looks pretty pitiful in this get-up, but it works! (I tried to have her wear it normally, but she ended up completely naked that night, so we had to go drastic!) Hopefully, this problem is solved and she will grow out of it before she grows out of the new sleepers I demolished!

I guess you never know what life with a two year old is going to be like! Sometimes it's excitement, sometimes laughter, sometimes tears, sometimes anger, sometimes sleep-deprivation...regardless, it's always an interesting day around the Odle house!