Bucka Fairy?

I know, it has been ages since I have had any food for thought. If it makes you feel better, I was also having trouble finding food for nourishment. I am doing better now, thanks for asking, and am enjoying cooking again as well as eating.

I finally have both kids down, Dapo is gone and it is just me! I really have been spending most of my time on facebook and putting most of my thoughts up there...so I now have a story to tell on my blog.

When I was a kid my parents taught me about Santa. Every Christmas we'd write our Christmas letter to Santa, along with one item we wanted Santa to bring us. On Christmas Eve we'd make cookies and leave one out with a glass of milk. We would hang stockings on the chimney with care. We awoke with great anticipation on Christmas morning to find the cookies were gone and find the aforementioned stockings loaded with goodies and fruit and perhaps a small toy. Santa was so good about bringing exactly what I had asked for! Christmas was the most wonderful time of the year!

When I was in the third grade I would have been 8, almost 9 years old. I was going to a private school at the time and we were learning songs for the Christmas special. I said something about Santa, and one of the boys in class told me "There is no such thing as Santa, stupid!" The whole class laughed and laughed about how funny it was that Kari still believed in Santa. What's worse, I defended my views retorting, "Of course there's a Santa, who puts presents under your tree, then?" "Your parents, DUH!" More laughter ensued. So now not only was I humiliated, but I had learned that my parents had been lying to me for over 8 years. NO SANTA?? Why had they done this to me?!

The teacher actually had to take me into the hall and calm me down because I was crying and she knew that I had just had my little world shook upside down. Of course, this is the same teacher who would smack your knuckles with a ruler if you got out of line, but today she was emoting compassion.

I wound up forgiving my parents, but promised myself I would never do that to my children. No Santa. No Easter Bunny. No Tooth Fairy. I just didn't see any reason to make up a lie just to let them down later. I would have been just fine if my parents had eaten the cookies, stuffed the stocking and bought the present all those years.

But what about the Binky Fairy??? This last week has been a hard week on all of us as we've taken the pacifier away from Jimi. He was rather attached to it. I've had several people suggest we explain to him the binky fairy has come and taken the binkies away and gave them to other little babies. It worked for them, they say!

I'm torn by this for two reasons. One, I think Jimi would not be as giving as my friends' children. I think the sight of the binky (or bucka, as he calls it) would send him into a tissy. Two, I think the Binky Fairy would have to fall into the same category as Santa, the Easter Bunny and the Tooth Fairy. You know, a convenient lie I tell to make it easier to live amongst the status quo? To each his own.

Thanks for the suggestions, though. I think I will just have to tough it out and keep singing him to sleep until he gets over it. He still asks for it at every nap and bedtime. He also asks for it at various intervals during the day. He has torn up the house three days in a row looking for it in every drawer he can open (and he can open them all ever since he figured out how to open the "childproof locks").

I take solace in the fact I am doing the best thing for him, even if it is hard on me.