Who doesn’t love the pixelator?

This is my youngest with his patented double pacifier move.  I’ve seen him juggle more, happy as a clam.  We’ve told him that when he turns 3 and has his big “Duckie Party”, it will be time to say goodbye to his pacifiers.  We told him that we will attach them to his birthday balloons and say goodbye.  He and I both dread the day.  Rather, I dread the night after his symbolic pacifier floats up up and away.

It was much easier with his older brother.  Sometime around 2 all his pacifiers were dirty at the same time and then he never asked about them again.  I chalked it up to something right I must have said or done.  My second child is my humbling child (and for that I really do thank the little scamp).  We’ve tried the dirty trick, both on purpose and by happenstance, but no dice.  He practically chained himself to the kitchen gate until we figured out a way to sterilize, STAT!

So do your kids use pacifiers or do they all gnaw on organic Birch wood stumps lovingly hand-carved by your partners at night as you both don’t watch television?  I am not defensive about these little plastic orbs I swore my children would not use, nope, not at all!

If you are like me, and you succumbed, when did your kiddos stop?  How did you help them with the process both before and after?  And what did you use to pacify yourselves?