Bye Bye Binkie's

It's been 72 hours and we've been binkie free around here. We've been planning this for quite a while. We knew the binkie's had to go. The idea just seemed so sad, to take away my daughter's happiness...her joy...her best friend....her addiction. Our boys never took binkie's, so this was all new to us. On Saturday we went on a hunt around the house and gathered binkie's into the binkie basket. Alyssa was very excited about the idea of mailing her binkie's to Strawberry Shortcake in Strawberryland. We got the idea from Emma Jo a few months ago and I loved it. This way, Alyssa takes ownership for sending them away as opposed to me just chucking them. We let her have her farewell time...she took a bath with them (she had never done this before, but since we had them all gathered, I figured...why not?) And took some pictures of her and her last suck. For months I've had her leave the binkie's in her carseat when we go out and she'd have to say, "one more suck" before dropping it in her seat and we'd head off to the store. She'd call out "binkie" to which I'd remind her, "we left it in the car."

On Saturday, we found 9 binkies, but I know of at least 2 that we didn't find. After putting them in an envelope to "mail" she carried her envelope in her strawberry purse to our mailbox down the street (luckily Saturday mail had already been delivered). Matthew kept saying, "Is Strawberry Shortcake real in real life?" We'd say no, but he didn't understand why we were sending them to a not real person. Michael videoed and the boys supported as I snapped picts along the way. She happily placed her envelope in the box and didn't really ask for them for at least an hour or two. We had a long drive in the afternoon to which I thought about waiting until after. A few times on our car ride, she'd call out for her binkie, to which I said, "Alyssa, where are your binke's?" and she'd say through whining "in the mailbox, going to Strawberryland." After a while she said she wanted them, but I'd keep reminding her that we shared them with Strawberry and it seemed to be a good enough explanation. She did 1 time say she didn't want to send them anymore, and wanted to get it out of the mailbox. She has also replaced her sucking addiction with a loud dinosaur like shriek...Not sure about that one. She fell asleep in the car that Saturday night, but Sunday night and Monday night, she went to bed just fine without them. I am shocked. Amazed. Happy. and Sad. She's ok, but I still feel bad for taking away her best friend. Don't worry, I'll be ok.