We did it!

I'm hoping that you never again have to see a picture like this:

Or like this:

Or like this one:

Yes, she is shoving food in her mouth while refusing to spit out her pacifier.

Or even like this one:

Instead, I'm hoping that you only see pictures like the following one:

Or like this one:

Yes, I'm even hoping that you see pictures like this one (crazy hair and all):

Did you notice the difference? Or rather what was missing in the latter pictures? That's right: Ya-ee is gone! Oh, you don't speak Evish. Ya-ee was Eve's name for her beloved pacis. And they are gone. She was so attached to them, I was dreading the day we would have to separate her from her one true love. I can't even tell you how many embarrassing remarks compliments we received on Eve's abilities to eat/cry/scream/talk/giggle/sleep all night while never removing her paci from her mouth. But it was time. It ended up being easier than I thought it would be. We had slowly been weaning her off and she had it mostly during naps and bedtime. Finally, during a visit to my mom's house, Jason and I informed her that we left Ya-ee back at our house. (Yes, Ya-ee is a proper name. The thing was practically family.) Eve just said "ok" and laid down and took a nap without it. She whimpered a little more than usual before falling asleep, but she hasn't asked for it since. It wasn't even a lie: We did forget to bring it on our trip. I was tempted to go buy a new one, but I decided I was not going to buy a pacifier for a 21 month old. So we told her the truth and she was ok with it. She didn't even ask for it when we returned home a couple days later. We have been Ya-ee free for over 2 weeks now. I'm so relieved.

And wasn't it a shame the silly thing covered her face in so many pictures? What a sweet face she has without it: