Paci, or no Paci?

I had always said that once Alex hit 1 year, I was going to throw out the paci and the bottle. In my experience, as a nanny, it seems the longer you wait the harder it is. So why am I having such a hard time giving the paci up?
I took Alex's day time bottles away weeks ago. It was easy, and I don't think he even noticed. The only down fall was trying to figure out how much food to give him instead. With the bottle I knew 6 ounces was enough. With puffs, it's a little harder to tell. (Also, Alex does not seem to stop eating......ever! We have to guess when he is full because he will just keep going.)
I knew the morning and night bottles were going to be a little harder, not just for him, but for me too! It has worked out well to lay him down with his morning bottle while I finish getting ready for work. Without me waking up early, and waking him up early, so I could feed him in the morning, I was not sure how I was going to do it.
I was not as worried about the night time bottle, but a little afraid that he wasn't going to sleep as well, without a belly full of formula.
My plan was to transition him during the week I had off, between Christmas and New Year, but then we all got sick. So I said "When this formula runs out, we're done". The last night bottle ended up being Saturday the 1st, and I had just enough left to give him 1 last morning bottle on the 3rd.
Our new nights are going well. Some nights he sucks down a sippy of milk, and some times he pushes it away. Sometimes I offer him a snack, but most nights he doesn't seem to need it. Joe rocks him, and we all watch a singing cartoon (and we sing along), then we brush his teeth and he is off to bed. He has not slept any less, so no problems there either.
His mornings have been going equally as well! I get him dressed then put him in his booster with a cup of milk and some dry cereal. He snacks while I start the car, or get our stuff together. Then when I get to work, I feed him with the other kids. I was worried that he would not want to wait that long (25 minutes), but he doesn't seem to mind it. Most mornings I catch him giving the dogs his cereal, so maybe he is not that hungry when he first gets up.

The paci on the other hand!!!!!!! First off, 99% of the time he only gets it in his bed. There has been a time or two when he is not feeling well, or is very grumpy, and I will let him have it, while we snuggle. I have put him to bed, a couple of times without it, and told my husband "cold turkey". Then I hear Alex talking, or playing and I think to myself that he can't fall asleep with out it, so I sneak back in and give him one! Silly, I know! Then there was the time, I just forgot and gave it to him the next day at nap. There was also one day when I did not give it to him at nap, and later I caught him sucking his thumb. To me thumb sucking is much worse, on account you can't take the thumb away! So I gave in again after seeing that!
I really want to be done with them, before he can ask for it. It's just seems nice for him to have it in bed, in case he wakes up, and wants it in the night. Don't tell anyone, but sometimes I even think he looks cute with it too. Like a baby, even though he is getting to be such a big boy! I think I will set a goal of February 1st. It sounds like I want the darn thing more than he does!




Day 1: Not so good! I thought I had forgot to put a paci in Alex's bag, so I thought it would be a good day to try putting him down for a nap without it. I did everything the same (minus the paci), and as soon as I closed the door I could hear him stand up and start calling out. As if he was telling me that I forgot it! I gave him/myself 15 minutes. The whole time he was talking and calling out, so I gave in. I went down, but the paci (that I found in his bag) in his mouth and laid him back down. I did not hear another peep! He went right to sleep! I will try again at his next nap!
Nap number 2, I didn't even try. Alex was so tired, I just gave him the paci and put him down.

Bedtime, I didn't give in. I just laid him down with his bear, told him I loved him and walked out. We didn't hear another peep! I just hope he doesn't call out for it in the night!

Update: It's about a week after I first wrote this. Alex no longer gets a paci at night. He does fine and doesn't seem to notice that he doesn't have it. He still gets it at every nap. I thought he might take naps at home without it, since he sleeps in his bed at night without it, but I was wrong. He wanted it for nap times at home too.

I still have February 1st as my goal!

When you hear a calling!

We have decided to become licensed for foster care.

We had looked into foster care before we came to the conclusion that we wanted to adopt. I had always liked the idea of being able to love on some kids, when they needed it most. I had always thought I would make a good foster parent. Back in 2007 we went to the orientation, filled out a pre-application, and then never heard anything! We waited and waited and no one ever called us to take the next steps. We thought maybe we didn't qualify. Well, we did end up getting a call months later. The person said that there was a lot of firing and hiring going on, and they were sorry. At that point we had moved on, and we were working on having a baby.

Now that Alex's siblings are in foster care, we feel like we are being called back into the world of fostering. Not only by our social worker, but also by God! The hope is that we can get licensed as fast as possible, which sadly is not very fast at all, but it is what it is. We should be licensed in the next 3-4 months. When we are, Alex's siblings with be coming to live with us until they can be reunited with their mom. Or there is a chance that we could be up for adopting them, if need be.

I am excited about this new turn in our life, and I am ready for what 2011 has for us!

"The Call"..........times two!

Today we got called and were asked to take Alex's two older siblings as a foster to adopt (with crossed fingers) situation! We are beyond excited. There is a long road ahead of us, and we do not know much at this time, but it looks like this family of 3 might be changing to 5!

Bedroom, or toyroom?

After Christmas I had to find room for all of Alex's new stuff. My plan was to make a play room for him in the basement, but since we have had Alex, the basement has become our dumping ground. Our house is not very big, and Alex has a lot of stuff. I did not have the time to make an area for him, and I have found that our basement is a lot colder in the winter then I thought it was. So we will be using his room to hold most of his toys until spring. We did put a few things away that he doesn't really use right now.

So I took out his rocking chair, which we never used. Alex never liked to sit in his room and rock, but now that it is in the living room, he wants to rock all the time! Since we didn't have a chair in there, we no longer needed an end table, so that got "dumped" in the basement.

His cube organizer was where the train table is now. I never liked it there, so I am glad we could move it. He has a lot more floor room to play.

His closet holds some of the larger toys that we don't play with much, like his shopping cart, and a ton of stuffed animals. As you can see it is packed to the brim! It doesn't look so crazy to me when I look at it, but when I look at the picture, I feel like everything is going to come flying out. It's my organized chaos! I have cleaned it up a little this past week, but it needs a little more.

Here you can see 2 of Alex's favorite things. One is, closing his bedroom door. He loves to close the door, and play in his room. We always laugh and then get up and open the door back up. The other, is his reading nook. He sits on his giraffe chair, and pulls books out, and looks at them all by himself, which cracks me up because he does not like to sit and read books together. He is getting better and better at pulling lots of books out, so pretty soon I can going to take out most of the paper books.

This is the only real "baby area" left in his room (other than his crib). I almost "closed" up his changing table area a month or two ago. Alex got really good at flipping over during diaper changes, and I didn't want him to fall off the dresser. But then, just like that, he stopped. He is really good when he is up there now, and just plays with the toys that we keep up there for him. Here is the link to my post about his room when we first got it done: http://ouradventurethroughadoption.blogspot.com/2009/11/baby-room-check.html