bye-bye binky!

binkies are a touchy subject. should you use one? how long should you use one? how to get rid of it? will it be hard on my baby's teeth? (have you seen my child's teeth???)

i for one, have loved the binky. long car rides, quiet places, cranky babies, airplanes -- it was always an easy little solution to whip out and mackenzie loved it.

our pediatrician recommended weaning mack from the binky before three. i nodded, thinking three was an eternity away, and pushed that milestone off to a far corner of my brain...

but now it's summer and mackenzie is two and a half and it is time.

did i mention she loves her binky? adores it really.

i knew we should start brain storming how to take it away, but to be honest i was scared. mack goes to bed so easily, happily sucking down on her binky in true maggie simpson fashion. although the binky use had been cut down to only nighttime/nap time use, i knew this summer we were going to have to face up, binky had to go.


while on assignment last month, i mentioned my dilemma to another mommy there and she told me her brilliant idea. she had made a special trip with her little girl to none other than...build-a-bear....and stitched that puppy right into a new special stuffed animal.

and that, my friends, is exactly how mackenzie came to lose her binky...

 

(justin really hoped she would stick with the eagle, alas, she chose a lamb)

 

 (next "lamb-y" was stuffed)

 (there goes the binky! she did give it a little kiss before it went in)

 

(still excited, she hasn't really grasped that this is the end to her binky sucking days)

 (done deal)

mackenzie did cry at bed time that night when she asked for her binky and we reminded her that it was in lamby. i think at the moment she would have traded lamby out for her binky, i actually wondered if we would find a gutted lamby the next morning and her happily sucking away. but after night one, she hasn't asked for it again. bye-bye binky!