TWO PACI'S ARE BETTER THAN NONE

I put her in bed with one paci. There must have been another hidden in there somewhere though, because she called me back over from tucking in James to show me her "two paci's!" and then asked me to take her "pit-sure". All smiles. So happy with her paci's.

And no, obviously we have not taken away her paci. We tried one night, shortly after her dentist appointment. It was a disaster. SHE WOULD NOT GO TO BED. After an hour and a half of fighting and complaining and crying dramatically for her paci ("I want my pa-ci-hee-hee") and screaming every time we left the room, we gave in. Cora won again. This girl is probably going to be 'getting her way for the rest of her life' (yadda yadda yadda - I don't care). We're suckers. We don't like to hear her cry or see her sad. We don't like her disturbing James' sleep. And we sure don't like missing out on OUR sleep (yes, she's still STTN, thank goodness - we might even have a record here, something we worked very hard to achieve and waited almost 2 years to get). Honestly, I've been doing some of my own research, and at this point I'm inclined to let her go ahead and keep that paci for as long as she darn well pleases. She doesn't bite it or play with it. She still uses it as a SOOTHER, as intended, to calm and relax herself. If it's limited to bedtime and the 20-30 minutes per night that she uses it to fall asleep and put herself back to sleep in the middle of the night, my theory is that she still NEEDS it. As we lay on the floor of James' room at night, waiting for his breathing to slow (and his talking to stop) and listening for Cora's sucking rhythm to regulate, then cease, I feel like we're doing the right thing. Our kids may be growing up, but in our eyes, they're still babies. They're OUR babies, and if they need snuggles and sporadic conversation and pacifiers to fall into a secure and restful sleep at night, then I guarantee you that is what we are going to give them. 

Because they're only babies for a short time.