Necessity

...is the Mother of Invention.

In the last week we have stopped giving Nicholas a Binky while he is awake. He still has them at night and during nap times and we will continue that for a while. But during the awake times, we simply remove them. He actually hasn't seemed to notice and I thought to myself, "Wow! That was easy."

Until I saw this earlier today...

What you are seeing is a wooden puzzle piece with a knob to make it easier for small hands. Yep, Nicholas is using it as a Binky. He has apparently decided he is not yet ready to give up his oral fixation.

And in other news, Nicholas had another first today. His first temper tantrum. Caused when I refused to allow him to suck on electrical cords. (Yes, I'm a mean Mommy.)

I told him "no." He looked at me and did  burst of screaming, then turned back to trying to grab the cords. So I went to pick him up to carry him away form the cords. He did that limp thing all children seem to instinctively learn as they enter toddlerhood. You know, where they go completely limp and make it very difficult to pick them up.

So I set him back on the ground, where he continued to scream and flop about. He even made real tears.

I went over to his toys, picked one up and started playing with it. As soon as he realized that I was not only ignoring his screaming, but actually playing with his toys, he immediately stopped screaming. He looked at me for a moment, a little confused, and then crawled over to join in the playing.

So the first tantrum is behind us. But I am quite certain it will not be the last tantrum. He may not be quite walking yet, but we are definitely entering the Toddler Stage.