Julia's love affair with her soother

Anyone who knows us, or even looks at pictures I post, knows that Julia is completely attached to her soother. I can't even tell you how many soothers we have kicking around the house. So I decided last week (mostly after looking through hundreds of pictures and seeing very few of Julia without her soother) that it was time to say goodbye to the awake time soother. I told her Sunday morning that she was a big girl and that she could have her soother for sleep time, but that was it. She had a few crying fits on Sunday, but was pretty easily distracted. Monday she asked about her soother, but easily accepted that it was in her crib. Wednesday, she didn't even mention it. Yep, it was that easy! I don't know if I'm just imagining it, but I swear she is talking more now, or at least I understand more. It's amazing as to how much I'm noticing it.

The funny thing is that Nicole has taken it upon herself to teach Julia how to suck her thumb. Luckily Julia isn't interested. I actually think taking Julia's daytime soother away is helping Nicole realize she has to stop sucking her thumb. I've noticed Nicole sucks her thumb a lot less these days. She went so far as to tell Julia, during a soother crying fit, that she only sucks her thumb in bed too (I tried not to roll my eyes when she said it).

Maybe we are on the road to getting rid of the oral fixation in this house! But would that mean I have to stop biting my nails? ;)

Nicole got her ears pierced!

When Nicole was born I went through a phase where I really wanted to get her ears pieced. I think I just hated when people called her a boy! But I decided to wait until she was older and asked to have it done. They're her ears after all. I figured it would happen when she was around 8 years old. But Nicole is always ahead it would seem! :)

A couple of weeks ago she started asking about earrings and holes in ears. I explained how it worked and she said she wanted to go ahead and get earrings. I told her it might hurt, that she had to take good care of them, and that she would have to sleep with them in. None of this phased her.

So, on Saturday, I took her to the mall. She picked out a pair of white gold, diamond looking (I don't remember the stone's name) earrings and then sat up on the stool and waited for the girls to get everything ready. It took them quite a while to get everything sanitized, I thought for sure Nicole would change her mind then. But she just sat there, clutching the teddy bear they gave her to hold on to. They made little marks on her ears and then were ready to go. Luckily it wasn't too busy, so they could do both her ears. I had visions of Nicole walking around with one earring because she refused to to the second ear. So, after a count of 3, in went the earrings. Nicole didn't even flinch. I was so nervous for her, but she was wonderful! I was so proud of her.

She's been doing a great job taking care of them (well, letting us take care of them) and she has been good about not playing with them. I'm sure her friends are tired of hearing about them, she is very excited!

My baby is growing up!

We Need A Snowblower and The Rules of the Table

I have 2 unrelated, but cute stories today.

Nicole declared tonight that "we really need a snowblower". I figure if a 4 year old says we need a snowblower, we've had too much snow! So we decided she was right and went out to find a snowblower. It would seem Nicole wasn't the only one with that good idea - the stores are completely sold out of snowblowers. So I guess Nicole will have to make do with shoveling for the time being. ;)

Nicole spent most of dinner lecturing us about the "rules" of the table. According to her, it is rude to talk with your mouth full, touch other people's food (this one was said as Julia had her hands all over Nicole's food), and put your hand in someone's face while they're eating - another rule Julia broke at dinner. Pretty soon we can stop parenting and let Nicole take over. ;) Nicole has become quite the little teacher, so much so that Julia is picking it up. Julia now lectures Nicole. This morning Nicole wanted jam on her toast and we had already put butter on it. So we said no to jam. Nicole threw a fit and Julia very calmly stated "no jam Nicole, eat your toast". I laughed out loud. Nicole wasn't impressed. But she did eventually eat her toast. :)