More Nanny Jo
In the post about Nanny Jo, I described an episode of Super Nanny in which the children were still having an evening bottle and wearing diapers to bed. They were almost three and five years old. Anyway, one of the things that Nanny Jo did was to tell the children that the Nappy Pirates were coming. There was a big chest that was painted with pirates wearing diaper hats. She said that if the kids put all their diapers in the chest, then the pirates would come and take them during the night and leave them something in the chest.
So the kids were really excited, collected all their nappies and put them in. The next morning it was like Christmas. They were so eager to see what the Nappy Pirates had left them. It turned out to be some cool pjs.
I thought this was such a clever way to break a child’s bond with something like a diaper. They were giving something up, but they were also getting a surprise too. This can work for any number of things that you need your child to transition away from: bottles, pacifiers, diapers, or any other remnants of babyhood that they are still clinging to and need to move away from. If pirates are a little scary for your toddler, you can say the Pacifier Fairy is coming or the Bottle Fairy. Then make sure to get them a little something that they’ll love.
Give this a try if you need to wean your toddler away from pacifiers, bottles, diapers, or even baby food.
Super Nanny has a site on ABC that you can go to catch up on the show or to get some parenting tips from the nannies. Click here for that site. You can also check out 451’s other parenting blogs for great tips and topics related to a range of parenting topics.
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