No Mo Dy-dee-do

From Matt Gleason: Georgia, god love her, will be five in April. Still, she's slept with a pacifier since babyhood. It's a part of her. We tried to coax it away from her a few times, but eventually gave up. Last night, though, an opportunity to free Georgia from the crackpipe that is her pacifier presented itself. Somehow, the pacifier went missing. I swear I didn't take it. For quite a while, Georgia's had a standing offer that if she gave up the pacifier, we'd buy her Cinderella on DVD. So in the absence of the pacifier yesterday, we offered to take Georgia to see "Tangled" at the theater. She's been talking about the movie since it came out. It was an exciting possibility for Georgia, because she's never been to a movie theater before ... and she's a sucker for candy. Amazingly, Georgia went to bed without a fight. Of course, she woke around 5:15 a.m. wondering where in the Dora the Explorer her pacifier went. Then she came looking for me in bed at 5:30. I was none too happy, but sacrifices had to be made for Georgia to be dy-dee free.

Later, at the movie theater, me, Virginia, M.J. and Georgia had an arsenal of smuggled candy to eat during the flick, which turned out to be an outstanding movie. Georgia, however, seemed like she wanted to bolt every few minutes. For a kid who once ran screaming from an Elmo movie, it probably wasn't smart to take her to a movie that included: A kidnapping, fatal stabbing, countless scary guys with swords, a near-drowning and an evil witch. Towards the end of the movie, we left the theater altogether. Just before we walked into the parking lot, Virginia asked Georgia if she wanted to go back to the movie. Georgia, surprisingly, did. We got back in the theater just in time for the handsome rogue to get stabbed by the witch. Not cool. But we waited long enough for Georgia to see the princess get her happy ending. Afterward, Georgia said the movie made her, in no particular order: "Happy," "sad" and "scared." I, for one, loved it. So did Virginia. A great date movie, even if the date involved calming a nervous 4-year-old in my lap while my amazing wife nursed a baby for the better part of 90 minutes.

So, in all, it was a very historic day for the Gleason family. Now it's time to bribe Darby to poop on the big girl potty.