5. Banished

Day 5: A Blog A Day In May

I've finally banished the blanket.

If you remember a couple months ago I made a post about the sad state of Caleb's blanket. And I posted pictures of his old one, and then the blanket-double that my mom had made to replace it. It took me forever to make myself get rid of that tattered thing. He just loves it so much. And we've been talking about it for what seems like forever. Every night I tell him "You're going to have to say good-bye to your blankie because it's getting ruined. It just keeps ripping." And he always says, "Not yet?" And so I put it off. Well yesterday I tried a different approach. Around bedtime I had just put his jammies on and he asked, "Where's my blankie"

"It's gone son."

"You throw it in the garbage?"

(I hadn't actually done anything yet....it was actually still sitting on his bed)

"It's gone now. You'll just sleep with your new one."

"Where's my new one?"

"It's on your bed."

As he goes towards his room to get it I yell "WAIT!" (the old one is sitting there in plain sight)

"Lets brush your teeth first." And so I divert him to the bathroom and let him try to brush his teeth. (On a side-note all mommies should know that you should supervise your children's brushing until they're old enough to spit instead of swallow the toothpaste....which is usually around 6 years old. I was NOT doing this at the time though....)

I ran into his room and grabbed his blanket and threw it up on the overhead shelf in his closet. I'll go back in and grab it after he's asleep.

And now I'm showing you how much WORSE the blanket got before I finally told him it's gone. The prarie points have become a tail. And you can see the badding (no idea if I spelled that right....sorry if I didn't) all along the edge. If this thing weren't hand-quilted it would be separated into layers by now.
He never complained about his blanket being gone. I thought he was gonna throw a fit. That's why I've been putting it off for so long. But no....just like everything else that he's had to grow out of, he practically does it himself. When it was time to get rid of his nuk, he just quit using it. I thought for sure we would go through several days of him asking for it. But no. He quit using it all on his own.

And actually he used to be attached to a different blanket around the time he was 18 months old. But it was becoming a huge ordeal when I'd take him to daycare. He was stressing out about it all the time and he wouldn't play anymore. So we took a trip to Boise for a weekend and left it home. When we got back I hid it before he could see it. And he started sleeping with this winnie the pooh one instead ....... until it's dying day. Yesterday. I should throw it in the garbage....but Parker AND I aren't just sure about that for some reason. Maybe because it's so hand-made and sentimental. So for now it's at the bottom of my cedar chest. Maybe I'll show it to him in a few years.