finger feat

so so proud of my little girl and her recent feat! ellia's been sucking her first finger, or "my one" as she calls it, since she first found it as a newborn... 4+ years! when she turned 3 we started occasionally trying to nix the habit but never really enforced anything. at her last dentist appointment about 2 months ago, they said it was time to get serious about it. ive explained how continuing to suck her finger would hurt her teeth (and any other negative things I could think of) hoping that would merely be a good start. she wasn't seeming to catch on so we starting mentioning possibly putting a band aid or something on there as a reminder to her, but hadn't gotten that far yet.

One day she told us (with a very matter-of-fact-ive-really-thought-through-this-and-this-is-what-ive-decided tone) "I'm just not going to suck my finger anymore." We found it cute and funny and said "okay-great idea!" with no thought to it actually meaning much.
2-3 weeks later and I haven't seen a finger in that mouth once, even at bedtime. We've been amazed and so proud at the realization that she had just made up her mind and stuck to it. I'm not sure what actually triggered the decision, but no matter!

Today we decided it was time for a little reward, so we headed to Toy's R Us. We let her pick out something she wanted, which turned into more of a day-trip than we planned :) but hey! we were even able to use it as a little math-learning-time. She was given an amount to spend, so she would look at the prices and determine if it was too expensive or within her budget range. I was impressed at how well she did that... all the way through the store. (she was especially excited to discover she could, in fact, pick out more than one item as long as it was under her given amount = SCORE!)

here's are "big" girl with her chosen reward treats... a kindergarten learning activity book and a dora playdoh set!