Baby Girl

Oh, my baby girl.  Not the little one, though.  Paige lost her first tooth yesterday night!  She was SUPPOSED to be in bed going to sleep, but instead she was playing around with the tooth that's been loose for at least 2 months, and she pulled it right out!*

Paige has been having a hard time going to sleep without Stewart in the room.  I'm not sure if she's getting more afraid of the dark -- their night light has been "missing" for a few months -- or if she's just wanting to have a little late-night tete-a-tete with her friend, but she has been coming out of her room about 30 minutes after we put her to bed for the last couple of weeks with different important reasons -- she needs to get a drink, she's still hungry (sorry, sweetie, you should have eaten more dinner), she needs to go to the bathroom again (we have them go every night before bed to discourage this one)...

Well, a few nights ago, she came out at 9:45 with a headache.  Why did she have a headache?  She thought it was probably because of the scary shadow.  Her own scary shadow.  (I thought it was because she was up at 9:45 when her bedtime is 7:30!) I wasn't sure where that was coming from, because we haven't seen "Princess and the Frog" for a really long time (tangent: Why on earth would you make a guy who controls scary shadows the villain if you are making a show for LITTLE KIDS? DO YOU HATE PARENTS???), but I told her that if she had a headache she could put a little ice pack on her head for five minutes and then go back to bed.  We talked about shadows, and I thought I might re-invest in a night-light for their room, but the next day we figured out what the real reason for the late-night insomnia.  Paige was trying not to suck her thumb -- and it was all her own idea!  We had been talking earlier in the week about how her tooth was loose and she should probably stop sucking her thumb so her teeth would grow in straight, and I guess she believed me.  It was really hard for her, and she told me later that she had some mistakes (her words), but I told her I was proud of her and that it was okay to make mistakes as long as she keeps trying not to suck her thumb.  It kind of broke my heart to tell her that -- because she's really starting to not be such a little girl any more -- but I was so discouraged by my attempt to stop sucking my thumb (as a KID, of course!) that I gave up even trying to stop for a few more YEARS.  I didn't even think about making that connection between our conversation and her headache until the next night when she asked me to put bear up.  I had told her that I thought the easiest way for her to not suck her thumb is to put Bear away and keep him on her bed during the day, but I think she's actually not quite ready for that big of a step -- she kind of teared up when I asked her if she wanted to not sleep with Bear.  I think it might take a while, but she's really trying to stop.  What a brave little girl!




*hilarious side-note -- this is the first time EVER that the tooth fairy has remembered to put $1 underneath a pillow before the child wakes up in the morning -- and it was at 2:30 a.m.!!!  Joel had gotten up to check his blood sugar, and I just suddenly woke up and couldn't go back to sleep until I asked him to go find a dollar in the change jar (luckily we had one).  He's such a great guy, too -- he totally did it for me because he can go back to sleep so much easier than I can!