No more dummies!

So, Owen has now been 2 weeks without his dummy (pacifier to you Americans). Yes, I know that he's almost 3 years old and that we should have gotten rid of it AT LEAST a year ago. But, he loved it in a serious kind of way (you should have seen his eyes light up every night in between brushing teeth and story time when he exclaimed "it's dummy time!" and ran to the kitchen to get one), and it seemed like such a daunting task to rid him of it. We knew we needed to take the plunge with both a whole weekend ahead of us with nothing major planned and at a time when we hadn't just (or weren't about to) faced anything life-changing or disruptive (eg, new baby, travel). Somehow it took us until a few weeks ago to finally give it a go.

Turns out we probably made a bigger deal about it than necessary (typical of most parenting dilemmas I think, at least for us). We are most definitely not above bribery - he received several little "Cars" movie cars and a play mat that looks like Radiator Springs the night he agreed to first sleep without the dummy, then after one successful night (and a naptime) we went to the Disney store and he got to pick out another present (Cars themed again of course). The biggest problem was convincing him that he wasn't going to be getting presents EVERY time he slept without the dummy. Oh, and that he wasn't just giving it up for a night or two, but that there would never, ever be another dummy at bedtime or naptime either at home or at nursery (day care).

He has become what I would call a more "needy" kid at bedtime now - he needs us to lie down with him for a few minutes and cries sometimes for us to come to him and when we ask him why he needs one of us he says "because I just do". But, really it's not that bad, and after the first week, I'm not sure he ever mentioned the dummy at bedtime again.

I have to say, when I started writing this a few minutes ago, I was sure he was at the 3 weeks milestone, but according to my post on Facebook after the first night it's only been 2. Amazing how it's like he never had such dependence on it...