NUK

Where did our baby go? We have held on as long as we could but little Livi is growing up. One of the last baby things we had yet to face was the NUK. Both my girls loved their nuks and Ben and I admit to being fans also. Olivia was down to keeping her nuk only in her bed and we knew when she turned the big 3 that we needed to call it quits, but we hated to. She loved to go to bed at night and still took a nap in the day, all because she wanted to get in her bed and suck that silly nuk. We knew things would change once we said goodbye.

Finally Ben and I got the courage to bite the bullet and quit the nuk habit once and for all. Livi being quite rational and agreeable understood it was time to say goodbye. She had one last drag and then lined every nuk up she could find in a special spot in her room she chose and then waited for the Nuk Fairy. Before she knew it, the fairy had visited and took every last nuk with her and left a new pair of PJs and a CD Player with a classical music CD for bedtime in their place. (Belle still goes to sleep to the sounds of Bach and Mozart 4 years later.)

When bedtime came there were tears and tears and tears. She was sad she had given those nuks away and begged for the fairy to return them. Sadly, she eventually cried herself to sleep and we have never looked back. She still asks for her nuk from time to time but mostly has made the transition gracefully. The saddest day of my parenting life may have been when with tears streaming down her cheeks she told me she had been trying to shrink back down but couldn't do it. Sweet girl. We wish we could shrink you back down, but for different reasons, as well.