The case of the missing pacifiers.

I wouldn't say that Alora is addicted to pacifiers. But she sleeps better when she has one, and she copes better with stressful situations or overtiring days when I pop one in her mouth.

Two nights ago, she was having a particularly tough time. It was late. She and Matt and I were all very tired. She wasn't settling down. And I couldn't find a single, solitary paci in the whole house.

Understand this: she has six of them. Six! Our house is lived-in, but decently clean; at least clean enough that we can generally find what we're looking for. There are a few places that we can usually find a paci in a pinch: under our bed for instance, or just under the skirt of the couch in the den. But this time, nothing. We took turns. We searched and searched. Left no toy unturned, and found nothing.

She got through that night, eventually. And last night. Not great, but okay. Today I was grocery shopping, and she started to fuss. We passed through the baby aisle, and I saw that lovely, colorful, gleaming display of nuks. "But self," I said, "this baby already has six pacifiers. Does she really need more? Surely the others will turn up. . ." And then my little redheaded Irish lass turned up the fussing, and I immediately grabbed and opened another package (boil? No. I stopped doing that when Abby was an infant, and they've all lived to tell the story). She immediately calmed down and slept through the rest of the shopping trip.

So we headed home, now owners of- count them- eight, size one, pastel, Nuk brand pacifiers.

Just a little while ago, she was acting sleepy. I went to find one of the new pacifiers. I found an empty package. I looked in all of the usual places. I looked in her carseat. Nothing! What black hole is taking all of the baby's pacifiers?!

Then genius struck. The older sisters were still awake. I went into their room and asked them if they had seen the baby's new pacifiers. Abby said no, Anna jumped up. I should note that Anna was suspiciously excited about the new ones; but she's really excited about a lot of things, so it was off my radar earlier in the day. But when she jumped, it came together. I asked Anna where they were. "The toy room!" She exclaimed in a joyous way that only Anna can. I asked her to show me.

She ran into the toy room with absolute purpose and direction. She lifted up one toy among many, and revealed not two, but FIVE pacifiers. Two pink, two white, and one of the new ones: green. Why were they there? Alora doesn't go in that room. Anna does have a funny habit of collecting like things together to play quiet little games that she never lets us in on. Apparently she's been playing something for the last two days. I guess she's done now.




But where are the other three . . . ?