The ya-ya fairy and other tales – or how to get rid of your kid’s pacifier

On the Swiss parents’ platform kids-tipps.ch I found a desperate mommy’s question about how to get rid of her kid’s pacifier.

We are not affected by this topic anymore, haven’t been since Colin gave his to Santa Claus in exchange of two toy cars he wanted.

But I liked the answers so much that I want to list some – and maybe help out other families:

Astrid’s daughter used all of her soothers to purchase a bicycle. The mom had called ahead before they went to the store. The girl selected her bike, handed the cashier her pacifiers and got out. Dad stayed behind to pay with “real money”. She asked for her comforters a couple of times, but let it go eventually.

I hear there's this store "bikes for binkies?"

I especially like the BBQ party that Sibylle, another mom, organized in the forest. A couple of families got together, enjoyed some food and lots of sweets and then buried a treasure box containing all the dummies as they are called in the UK.

How would you like your dummy cooked?

As I started writing this blog post I asked my English-speaking friends how they called the pacifiers, and they’ve come up with some fun names. And you can probably guess which names come from parents and which from babies: plug, mute button, “doi doi” (my Aussie mate Cain told me that), passie, sucky, ya-ya, nudgie.

 So let's get back on track, there are still some great ideas I want to share:

One lady posted that she saw a picture of another family who had tied the sucky to some furniture in the apartment, so the kid could only use it at that very spot. Another mom then commented that her 4 year old would not hesitate to get some scissors or even shears to cut off his beloved passie.

Michelle mentioned that there is a “Nuggibaum” (a nudgie tree) in the Zurich Zoo where parents can take their kids to say goodbye to their ya-ya.

Nuggibaum Blog Post

Rachel’s son was surprised that one night his passie seemed to have disappeared. The same the next night and the night after that; they just couldn’t find it anymore. For this little boy it is still a case of “without a trace” – not for Alison’s daughter, though. She refused to let her binky out for Santa or Easter Bunny, so she experienced a breaking and entering of the doi doi thief!! That’s right; they come and snitch pacifiers from 3 year olds!!

Stephanie and Michaela are mentioning a book “Florentina, the passie fairy” the story of a girl called Lea who attends Kindergarten and still thinks she needs her binky. Obviously hearing this story motivates kids to leave their passies out for the fairy and hope to get a gift in return. Florentina, die Schnullerfee

Monique says “ours was in fact picked up by the binky fairy. She used it to make a nice flower arrangement in binky land. She left a small gift to thank the big girl.”

Natascha’s boy became a big brother and handed over his binky to the new baby.  How cute is that?

Of course there is the sticker system “if you manage to fall asleep without binky you’ll get a sticker, and once you have collected 10 stickers you get a gift”. Or parents who trust in the course of nature: one day your kid will just decide that soothers are for babies and throw theirs away.

If you have a fun and creative way to wean kids off their ya-ya’s (or thumbs, for that matter), please leave a comment or send me a message.

What? A thief wants my binky??

Ooohps, I just realized: I still have mine!