Paige: Brace Face

I've joked over the years that we knew Paige would need lots of help in the oral category with her thumb sucking and tongue thrust...and we are in the thick of those days! From the combination of the 2, she had a pretty significant lisp and pretty messed up teeth, but oh she was cute and the thumb sucking was totally worth it for the self-soothing!

Her first time finding the sweet spot {grin}

Our dentist was very chill about her thumb sucking, and around Kinder or 1st grade suggested we start talking about it to see if we could get any interest from her to stop. She would try for maybe a couple of days and then tell us she wasn't ready!

Little open bite with her tongue sticking out and sucking away!

We did a round of speech therapy last year with her that was relatively successful. When she 'passed' it was with the knowledge that we'd probably need more speech therapy once she stopped sucking her thumb, but hey, we'll take a victory where we find one.

Fast forward to this past spring. The ONLY time Brent has ever taken the kids to the dentist. Paige needed 4 fillings AND the dentist said there was significant change {for the negative} in her mouth due to the thumb sucking and it was time to stop and see the orthodontist for braces. Gulp.

We made an appointment with the orthodontist where he told us we needed to get her to stop sucking her thumb immediately {putting in a crib}, we needed to adjust the roof of her mouth {expander}, followed a month later with braces...and if we didn't get the thumb sucking stopped, she would eventually need jaw surgery. Double gulp.

Step 1: Stop thumb sucking! We waited for school to finish and immediately the next week...the crib and expander went in. 

I was a little nervous how all of this would go, but we both handled turning the expander well {we delayed 2 or 3 times throughout the 20 turns needed to let the soreness subside but overall that was a non-event}. I was most concerned with her ability to fall asleep without sucking her thumb. It took us a couple of days but we got there very quickly! The first 2 nights, it took her maybe 30 minutes to fall asleep instead of her usual 10, but then she realized she could HOLD her thumb against her mouth and still snuggle Sackie, and the world was right again!

Thumbless sleep!

Step 2: Then about 6 weeks later...it was time for braces! Little Miss handled getting her braces like a champ, and they bothered her way less than the expander and way less than braces bothered Trent at first, so this was definitely a win!

You can still see that big open bite, we are ready to close it up!

She's had braces for about 4 months and her mouth has changed SO much! It's been wild watching it happen. One of her bestie's moms works at our dentist's office and even commented on how great her mouth looks.

8 weeks in...getting a power chain!

Already so much progress!

I keep forgetting to take a current picture because it's improved SO MUCH from this, it's kind of mind-blowing how quickly it's changing!

Back on the Rollercoaster

I mentioned last month that we were preparing to move all the kids around in the coming months. Well, we took a first step Sunday night...albeit an unintentional one. {grin}

How cute is this face? And YES we went swimming on Sunday!

And we went on a golf cart ride.

I showed you those pictures because Paige is the sweetest, most content, happiest, joyful little girl and pretty much always has been...except for 1 category: SLEEP CHANGES. {Remember some of her terrible infant sleep regressions? Yeah, they haunt my dreams still!}

She has started getting a little harder to get into her crib over the last few weeks. Wants an extra hug, fusses a little, cries after I leave to where I have to come back. But she had stopped climbing out of her bed and was mostly okay, so we kept on with her in her bed knowing we had the big room transition coming up.

Well, Saturday this escalated - she SCREAMED and CRIED when it was time to get into her crib - so hard and much that it was like she was scared of her bed. It took me quite a while to get her in her bed Saturday night and Sunday for her nap, but I got her down! Unfortunately, it quickly escalated at bedtime Sunday night to her being basically hysterical. And of course Brent had been gone Saturday - Sunday getting his deer stand and some of our family land ready for deer season. 

I took her mattress out of her crib and put it on the floor but she was still crying. I tried to stay in her room until she fell asleep, she turned her mattress into a trampoline. I finally took the front off her crib and converted it. This was after 9:00 PM which is the perfect time for an unplanned bed conversion, ugh.

My least favorite parenting phase - the converted bed phase!

[well, not counting the newborn phase ha]

I decided to employ an old Super Nanny strategy I remember from WAY back in the day - just walk her back into her room over-and-over without stalling or talking much. That probably happened at least 20 times and I would put her back in bed, tell her I loved her and I'd see her in the morning. Sometimes she was pulling on my clothes before I was even out of her room! But I prevailed and by around 10:00 PM she finally laid down and went to sleep.

Success!

[It never gets old seeing her suck her thumb, ha.]

She woke us up at 6:30 AM because she fell out of the bed, but I mega count this as a success! I woke up probably 5 times and looked at the monitor thinking I heard her waking up, it never happened!

Last night I put a toy bat under the sheet and mattress protector to create a little barrier and hopefully keep her from falling out - I told y'all I wasn't prepared for this transition! BUT I only had to walk her back into her bed TWO TIMES! The second time she kept begging me for a hug, and I got her back in her bed, gave her a hug, and she laid down, inserted her thumb, and didn't make a peep again.

Might I finally have a kid who transitions out of the crib easily?!?! It'd be about time!

Long Lindemann Lake Weekend

Whew! We had a great vacation at the end of last week with my mom's side of the family at a rental house on Lake Whitney. We went up Thursday and came home Sunday. Normally, a lot of my cousins come, but this time it was just me and my sister {and our families} of the 12 grandkids, and 3 of my mom's 4 living siblings came. The house had 8 bedrooms, so we were able to spread out and it was great!

Before we get to the trip, I have to share how I started off my Thursday - with my first {and hopefully last} root canal! I had 2 cavities when I was 7 and then none until I was 30. But each time I stopped breastfeeding a child, I end up with a mouthful of problems. With Trent, I had a tooth literally crumble in my mouth plus 4 cavities, and with Drew, I had 4 cavities. So it turns out when you have a deep filling, over time it can cause nerve damage...who knew? One of those fillings {from Trent} was the culprit, and I was having major pain in half my mouth from Sunday onward.

Hey tooth #15, let's get you fixed up!

I love numbing shots that take away pain!

I don't love looking like I have bells palsy afterward though. {grin}

So we were able to load up Thursday about 4:30 {after Paige's marathon 3.5 hour nap} and head out. A quick stop at Starbucks and we met the rest of our family at a restaurant a few minutes from our rental house. {My mom rode with me, Brent stayed home to take care of some stuff around the house in preparation for some of HIS family coming this week!} We got our food to go because Paige was DONE, went to the house, put her down, and then the rest of the family arrived and the kids went WILD. The 5 big cousins were SO HAPPY to be together and they all, of course, wanted to sleep in Babs and Pops' room. #nope #theyweretooexcited

Trent was my bed partner Thursday night!

She slept SO good the whole trip, yay!

And got to try food! Bananas and avocados

Babs and her baby

We played so many games {which I LOVE}:

Uno, Skip-Bo, Spades, Spoons, Pie in the Face, Dominos

My mom and sister broke open the champagne at 9:00 AM on Friday!

Such a goober!

Trying to get some sun on my pasty white legs

Assemby line bathing {awesome tilework, no?}

Saturday it rained a lot so it was more card games and drinking

The house we stayed at wasn't ON the water and didn't have a pool {which I liked with little babies} but we were about 2 minutes away from the water.

YUM

I know with babyled weaning you can feed your kid anything,

but they probably didn't expect a playing card to be a snack!

OMG, the love between these 2 {and no idea how Drew got a black eye}

Washing dishes and dancing to Jay-Z

Sleeping sweetie

My Saturday night bed partner

Finally a picture of my parents with all of their grandchildren!

#theSwopesix

We stopped at the lake for the kids to swim one more time {they got to go for a few hours Saturday after the rain left} and wear them out even more

Drew found 'tuna fish' {or bait...whatever}

Paige trying to eat grass

Tired girls!

We stayed up too late, ate too much junk, drank too much, and made some amazing memories!

Suck Up

I get some comments about Paige sucking her thumb to where I know some people either think I'm a weirdo for liking that she's a thumb sucker or they think I should stop it before it becomes a habit or both, ha. BUT I might be biased to thumb sucking based on these pics. {grin}