JUST SUCK IT!

In the last few weeks Tina and I have truly witnessed the end of an era. Our little Sophia is no longer sucking her thumb. For five years running we've been able to count on a little chip on her shoulder, a precious smile on her face, lots of crazy jigs and her right thumb in her mouth. When she hit three or four years old she would often tell us what a big girl she was. When I'd catch her with her thumb in her mouth I'd say, "I thought you were a big girl now, big girls don't suck their thumbs." She would always tell me, "Daddy, I'm part big girl and part little girl still." For the past year she told us she would quit sucking her thumb when she turned 5. Sure enough, within a week or two of her birthday on April 3rd, Tina and I realized one day that we never saw her thumb in her mouth anymore. We asked her if she had stopped and she simply said (in her cute raspy little voice), "Yes." I asked her the other night why she quit and she said, "Because I wanted to be like you guys." When I asked if she missed it or if it was hard to quit she said, "Oh, yeah. I would keep telling myself 'Don't suck your thumb, don't suck your thumb' but my thumb kept saying, 'Suck your thumb, suck your thumb, JUST SUCK IT!" Tina and I both agree that while it's probably better for her teeth and her dry, cracked thumb, we both kind of miss our baby girl's signature move. No longer will we get to witness her in the bathroom 'plunging' her right thumb in and out of her left hand with soapy water (which by the way must always be cold) so she could "get all the germs off of her thumb before it went in her mouth." It seems unlikely she'll ever give up on lining any toilet that's not in our house with either toilet paper or paper towels before she sits down, or grabbing bathroom doors with either a paper towel or her sleeve pulled over her hand when she leaves one. Besides that, the chip, the jigs and the smile are still in rare form.