Random Cuteness

Ok, it's been a while since I've updated this thing with pics of our adorable little girl, (you all know she is) so here are just a few random pics found on our camera.

I have no idea what she's doing in the laundry basket, but she sure is cute.

Here she is holding her new Barbie that she earned for completely filling her potty chart.

These two show Rylee with morning hair. Yes, that's her morning hair. We couldn't style it that cute if we tried.

And finally, here's our little Zowie "decorated" by Rylee.

Ok, two quick Rylee stories:

1. So far Potty training is going really well. She has no trouble letting us know when she needs to go potty and loves flushing the toilet afterward. She's still struggling with going number 2 in the toilet, but we're getting there. She has come up her own terminology however. Disclaimer: We did not teach her these, she came up with them all on her own.

When she goes potty she calls it "Poopin' a water". And when she goes poo she calls it "Poopin' a big one". Where she came up with these we have no idea. But they're so cute that we can't help but perpetuate them.

2. Just the other day we were cleaning the house. Rylee wanted to bring her little rocking chair out into the living room, but since we were cleaning the room I told he she had to leave it in her own room. She tried to bring it down the hall and I promptly picked it up and returned it to her room. That did not make her happy. I then proceeded to clean the kitchen and make dinner. When I came back out I found her sitting in the living in her chair. I told her to come and eat, and after she was sitting in her highchair I again took her rocking chair back to her room. Well, she saw me do this from the kitchen and yelled, "Hey! Don't take my rocking chair to my room right now!" (She always adds the words "Right now" when she's angry.) She then followed up with this exclaimation, (and the reason for the story) :

"I am so sick of this!"

Yes, she did. Guess where she got that? Hehe. We laughed.

Bryce, Bryce Baby

First off I will apologize for the title. It's cheesy, I know, but I couldn't help myself. A few weeks back we went to Bryce Canyon for the weekend. I'm just now getting around to throwing some pics up from it, so enjoy.





We forgot a coat for Ry (great parents we are), so she spent the first evening wrapped up in her blanket.



Cute family shot at a lookout spot.


Rylee with her cousins Davey & Jami.

Mel and Madison

The whole family.












And finally, a few random shots of the canyon.














And now a few Rylee stories for those who haven't heard them:

1. We were in church not too long ago sitting behind Mel's brother's family. Rylee loves to play with her cousin Timmy, but they tend to play like cats and dogs. During the meeting Rylee and Timmy began to fight over a toy truck that Timmy had brought with him. Both were saying, "My truck!", "No, my truck!". To silence the foray we quickly separated the two and sat them on opposite benches.
Well, Rylee, who still had the truck, kept saying to herself, "It's my truck, it's my truck, it's my truck."
We've been trying to break her of the whole "My" phase, and so Mel leaned over and told Ry, "If you say MINE one more time, I'm going to take the truck away."
Rylee, not to be beaten, thought seriously about this for several moments, mumbled a few things and finally said, "It's Rylee's truck."
That's my little smart alec.

2. As we were sitting eating dinner one night Rylee was singing the ABC's while she ate. As it is her version of the ABC's tend to be a bit choppy, but in this case she added her own ending. The song went something like: "ABC... QRS... Now I know I... Need more white milk, Mommy." And she held up her cup.

My kid's so dang cute.

More later.

Fashion Victim

Yesterday Rylee decided to take fashion into her own hands. She was up earlier than usual and therefore I was up earlier than usual as well. Consequently, while Mel was at work, I spent half the morning on the couch in a half-comatose state while Rylee ran around the house doing her own thing. (Now before you freak out, I was paying attention to her, I wasn't completely unconscious.) At one point, however, I rolled over to find her standing in front of me in nothing but her diaper, her black church shoes, and her snow cap with the fluffy bobbles on top. When I laughed at her because it was so cute, she responded by saying, "Hey! I yike it." (Yike of course meaning Like). Hey, who am I to judge her choice of attire? Hehe.

What made it all the better, when I let Zowie outside for the morning, and then went to the restroom myself, I came out to find Ry chasing Zowie around the backyard in this getup; out in public where just anyone could see, hehe. Like her father, my daughter has no shame. Here are a few pics of the outfit:

Famous

On Monday this week Mel, Rylee and I took some Russians visiting my from Latvia to the open house of the new Oquirrh Mountain Temple. It was a neat experience and is a very pretty temple. We enjoyed the walk through and are excited to be able to attend this new temple as it will be the temple assigned to our geographic area. As we were leaving a news anchor from KSL Channel 5 asked if we would answer a few questions for the news. We said "Sure, why not" and talked to him. He then asked Ellen, the Latvian girl staying with my parents a few questions as well and put it all on the four o'clock and six o'clock news as well as quoting us in the article on KSL.com. It's not a big deal, but it was kind of cool. I'm going to try to post the video link below, I don't know if it will work.

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

There and Back Again

I am finally getting around to posting pictures from our trip to Baltimore and Washington DC a few weeks ago. For those who don't know, my little brother Gordo moved his little family out to Baltimore last fall to work for the Navy. So in May we decided to go out there for a visit and to see the sights in DC. Mel was really excited because she's always wanted to go to our nation's capitol. We also went to Gettysburg, (another place Mel has always wanted to visit), the National Zoo, and Six Flags. Here are some pics:


This is Rylee and Dima standing in front of the Washington Monument while we waited to get our tickets to go up inside of it.



Here is the Washington Monument itself. The second picture is taken from the Lincoln Memorial. I really like this monument so I took a lot of pictures of it.















These are pictures from the Tomb of The Unknown Solider and Arlingotn Cemetery where my great-grandparents and great uncle are buried.



















Here are a few of the planes at the National Air & Space Museum.











In the Archives where they house the Constitution, Declaration of Independence and Bill of Rights, along with other important papers from our history, you are not allowed to take flash photography because the light will damage the documents. So this is the best picture I could get of the Constitution.



These are a few pictures from Gettysburg. The battlefield is huge and is peppered with various statues and monuments to the various battalions and regiments from every state that fought in the battle.





This is the painting on the inside of the Capitol Building rotunda. It depicts George Washington surrounded by Lady Liberty, Lady Justice, and some ten or so other ladies with significant meaning that I can't remember. Personally I think it makes him look like kind of a Playa, hehe.


This is the Wall of Stars at the WWII Memorial. Each star on this wall represents 100 soldiers who died in the war. It's rather humbling to see just how many people gave their lives fighting against the tyranny of Hitler.



This is us with Bugs Bunny and Wyle E. Coyote at Six Flags. The second picture is Gordo, Al, Mel and I soaked to the bone after going on the log flume at Six Flags. It took us all day to dry off after that. Luckily, even thought it had been raining all week, the sun came out for the afternoon to assist in the drying.









And finally the DC temple. We were able to get babysitters on Wednesday night and go with Gordo and Sharee to do a session at the DC temple. This temple has one of the most beautiful Celestial Rooms I've ever seen. Well worth the trip.










That's all I'm going to post even though I have hundreds more. Needless to say it was a neat trip and it was good to spend some time with Gordo, Sharee and little Dima who is talking up a storm and just the cutest little guy.

And toes.

Mel has taught Rylee a new song. The video will speak for itself. It's pretty much the most adorable video ever, but I might be a bit biased.

Everybody Dance!

This is just a quick clip of Rylee Playing Dance Dance Revolution. She loves it and most of the time won't let Mommy and Daddy play at the same time because she has to be using at least one of the two pads.