the daily joys of motherhood...

little miss independent (and aspiring fashionista?)

Motherhood is a choice you make every day, to put someone else's happiness
and well-being ahead of your own, to teach the hard lessons,
to do the right thing even when you're not sure what the right thing is...
and to forgive yourself, over and over again,
for doing everything wrong.

~ Donna Ball, At Home on Lady Bug Farm

Over the course of the past couple months, my little lady has been a roller coaster of emotions... they call it "TWO" ... One moment she's my sweetheart who melts my heart with a random hug or kiss before going back to her playtime, or trying to help me in the garden, with "aundrey" (laundry), or vacuuming - the next moment she is likely trying to declare her independence or find her voice, only it comes out in the form of a tantrum, a screech, or a straight up "NO! MIIIIIIIIIINE!" (I loathe these words!). I am so grateful for the numerous sweet moments (and the ability to journal them here where I can look back and remind myself from time to time that she really is a sweetheart), but I am definitely ready to move past this strong-will-independence-seeking stage! 

On another note- breaking the pacifier habit during this stage of "TWO" is not ideal.

 I was planning on breaking her bink habit after the new year, but with constant illness and then a difficult 2 months on top of one reason or another putting it off (let's face it, the bink is an excellent mute plug and it is mostly used for bed time/nap time)... 

but alas the time came when i felt compelled (and ashamed that my two year old still used a pacifier) to "pull the plug" just after turning 2. I started cutting the tips off her binks one by one as they would surface (the kid is no dummy, she has a stash everywhere!) Then when we had one final blue bink left (the sacred last binky,) it was as if she knew that was the last one and refused to sleep without it (screaming/crying so loud that our neighbors could hear at night), and so we have had a hard time taking that final bink away at night for about 3 weeks. Fast forward to this past Saturday, after a late night of no sleep at Grampa's house, then a busy day playing with her Nana, the sacred final bink got lost at Nana's and the dreaded time came inadvertently.

For 6 solid hours (unbelievable until you hear it first hand that crying that long is even possible) our little girl screamed, cried, whimpered, whined, and fought sleep without her bink... about half way through I lost my sanity and shut myself in my room to join her in crying out of sheer frustration and complete exhausted angst. Somewhere around midnight we both fell asleep, and each bedtime/naptime since then has gotten a tiny bit better, but I imagine this power struggle and coping without a pacifier to go to sleep will last the rest of the week... Lesson learned- next kid WILL NOT have a pacifier by 2 (maybe even one... but we'll cross that bridge when we come to it).