Three & {1/2}

I started this post a long time ago, but somehow it never got posted...


At the end of September, our Princess Rylee became officially 3 AND A HALF. Here are her 3 1/2 year pictures and a little bit about her. She is growing up SO fast! I think some days she acts a little closer to 13 than 3.


These first 2 were taken by our favorite photographer. We LOVE her! The rest were from a photo session I won. They are not my favorite, but some of them did turn out pretty cute...






Oh...what can I say about my Ry? She can be just about the sweetest thing alive and also the most stubborn little stinker! She hates for anyone to be sad. If you even pretend to be sad, she will immediately give you a big hug until she knows you are happy again. She has the biggest imagination and loves to play pretend and is so good at it! She can play by herself for hours and loves to play kitchen or princesses. She also loves to play "vacation" with Logan where they pretend to go on trips or Star Wars.

Ry is just about the biggest girly-girl ever. She loves all things pink, purses, jewelry, dresses and dress ups, anything Princess, sunglasses, dresses, skirts, tutus, gymnastics, dancing....like I said. ANYTHING girly!
Recently, Ry has become a TOTAL Daddy's girl. Now that Logan is off at school, Darren will frequently take Ry on little lunch dates or to run errands and she eats it up! She definitely knows how to get what she wants from him, too. I think he has little weakness for her! It is adorable! Ry also enjoys when the boys go do "boy nights" and we have "girl nights" and she always wants to paint her nails and watch a Princess show.
Rylee has some serious attitude and sass! She knows what she wants. If she doesn't want to do something, she will let you know it. She also has some of the most expressive facial expressions you will ever see and is a bit dramatic. She can give the STARE-down! We are constantly hearing "you hurt my feelings" and she is much more sensitive about things than Logan.
She also LOVES to be outside and gets dirty almost anywhere. I can NEVER keep her clothes clean! She loves playing on our new playground! She loves to swing and can pump her legs by herself. She loves bugs and digging in the dirt and if you didn't know how girly she was, you might call her a tomboy if you saw her playing outside.

She LOVES her little Polly Pocket sized Disney Princesses and spends a lot of her day dressing and redressing them and lining them up over and over. Actually, I spend most of my day dressing and redressing them the way that she likes them, according to what she tells me. Ry is a bit bossy and when you play with her, she will usually tell you exactly what to do. We are working on that...

She is really into shows lately. She has never been my TV watcher (that is definitely Logan!) but lately she LOVES Backyardigans and especially Dora and is always begging to "watch a show". She also loves anything Princess related and is really into the Disney movies. For awhile, her favorite was Cinderella, and then it was Belle. Right now, she is all about Ariel and The Little Mermaid.

Rylee LOVES her friends. She is always excited to go on play dates and is little Miss social. Her best friend right now is Madi Jackman. They have the exact same birthday and love to play together. Ry also just started joyschool this last month (where the moms teach) and really likes it. I think she mostly just likes to have something that is hers and likes to be big like Logan and go somewhere with a backpack (even though she doesn't need it!) She also loves her little friends there and to tell us all about it when she gets home. I think it makes her feel grown-up.

Rylee notices everything about people! She is always commenting on what people look like or what they wore and it makes me laugh that she will notice stuff like that, like that her friend, Gabe in nursery had on a pink shirt or that she wants her hair fancy like her friend Whitney Watkins. She is very into what she wears and it creates some battles. She always wants to pick her outfits and would be happy to dress head to toe in PINK. We are still working on matching things up. She also likes to pick outfits out for everyone else in our family. Her favorite thing is to match Avery, so I frequently match them so that she will let ME pick out her ensembles.

Rylee loves to be a little mommy. She is so good with her dolls and is always putting them to sleep and telling us to be quiet, or putting them in timeout. She wraps them up and carries them around and has diaperbags for them and strollers just like a real mommy. She also likes to pull up her shirt to "feed" them just like Mommy does... She also likes to mother Avery, but Avery doesn't really like that and they sometimes get into quiet the fight! I think Rylee has good intentions, but she is a little too small to carry Avery or tries to make her do things and Avery will not have it!

Despite a lot of effort and just about every bribe I can think of, Rylee is still NOT potty trained....nor does she show ANY interest at all in doing it. It has been a bit of a battle and I'm still not sure what to do about that....Any ideas???

Rylee is BOSSY! She tells everyone what to do most of the time. It is a good thing she has such a laid back older brother or there would be a lot more fighting at our house. She is definitely a girl who knows what she wants! When you play with her, she will tell you exact phrases that she wants you to repeat or where to sit. I think when she plays with her friends she is a little nicer than when she plays with her family (at least I hope she is...)


Ry loves having her picture taken and is quite the ham! She loves to be in front of the camera or the center of attention.

Rylee is a smart little girl. She knows all her colors and most of her shapes and is starting to learn her letters and the sounds they make. She hasn't been interested in any of that until lately, but now that SHE wants to learn, she is picking things up really fast. She loves to sing her alphabet all the time! She also loves to read. She doesn't really like us to read to her so much - sometimes she does, but a lot of the time she likes to "read" to us. She can't actually read, but she makes up good stories to go with the pictures, and a lot of times she will remember actual parts of the book and repeat them from memory. She also likes to pretend she is the teacher and read the books the way a teacher does and hold them up for us to see. Her favorite books are the Disney Princess books and Fancy Nancy books, of course.
Rylee is very artistic. She will color and draw for a long time and she makes great pictures. She loves to do projects. One of her favorite things are those little peel and stick foam stickers and she goes crazy with them. She is very meticulous with the way she places them and puts them into patterns and lines. She will use 20 or 30 on a page sometimes. She is also very organized about things, despite being VERY messy with her toys. She is always putting things into lines and lining things up over and over.
Rylee is VERY independent! She wants to do everything on her own and in her own timetable (which is why the potty training hasn't worked out so well...) She wants to pick her own clothes every day and can pretty much dress herself...minus changing her own diaper, of course. We struggle to get her ready though because if she is in the middle of something, she can't stop until she is ready, no matter how big of a hurry we are in. It causes a lot of fights when we need to get out the door. She tells me "JUST a SECOND!" about 100 times a day! We also fight a lot about what shoes she is going to wear - She is very particular about that for some reason. She is a very big helper though when SHE wants to be and can clean up so well. She loves to be helpful and her favorite job to help with is cooking. She is probably my biggest helper around the house and loves to please Daddy and me and will do little jobs for us without complaining...most of the time. She also knows how to get her brother to do a lot of things for her...the little stinker! For instance, if I say that the toys that aren't picked up are going to get thrown away, she will just wait for Logan to do it for her because she knows he will freak out if a toy gets thrown away, even if it isn't his and Rylee seems to care less. She is also probably my messiest child. This is mostly because when she plays with things, she can't just play with one or two things, she has to get out the whole "set" and get out ALL the things that go together. She also moves all the stuff to different places in the house and spreads it all out. She is hard to keep up with everyday!

Rylee is a TALKER! She can talk your ear off and she talks really well and says a lot of words. However, there are a few funny things that she just can't manage to say. They crack me up! One is "hostable" instead of hospital. Another is "babloon" instead of baloon. She also calls her belly button a "belly butt" until just recently. My all time favorite though is Gabriella (from High School musical). For some reason, Ry just can't say that and it comes out "Grabalabba". I never correct her funny little words because I love them too much and think they are so cute!

Rylee is non-stop all the time. She is not one to be still for long. She gave up naps long ago and is always on the go. She is really great at bedtime though. She stays in her bed almost all the time and goes right to sleep most nights. We usually read her and Logan each a story together and then they each get in their own beds to get their bedtime song and for prayers. Rylee always wants us to sing "I Know Heavenly Father Loves Me" and then we sing "Good-Night Sweetheart" and Rylee sings the funniest little "Baloolaloolaloo" in between the lines. It is hilarious and her little tongue making the sounds is so funny to watch! She usually sleeps with a stuffed animal or doll, but it is constantly changing. Never really the same one. She is a crazy sleeper and always is in a different position or even sometimes on the floor when we check on her at night.

Rylee can EAT! She is so funny and sometimes she won't much of anything at all for a few days and then will pack it away and out eat us all. She never really eats much breakfast, for some reason. Her favorite cereal is Lucky Charms, but she pretty much just picks out the marshmallows. I think her very favorite food might be shrimp! She LOVES them! She also loves fruits and vegetables. She will eat pretty much anything though and also loves all the kid favs like chicken nuggets and hot dogs and hamburgers. She isn't really a fan of PB&J though.

Rylee is such a fun part of our family and really keeps things at our house interesting! We love our Princess!!!