Almost 18 months of Evie

When you think about raising a little girl, you think you’ll need pastel-colored everything and loads of barbie dolls. You think you’ll be seeing a sweet little thing setting up her stuffed animals for a tea party and wanting to play dress-up all of the time.

I mean, at least, that’s what I thought it would be like. Now that Evie is days away from being a year and a half and her little personality is coming out in everything that she does, I realize that I actually know nothing about raising a little girl. And there is no possible way to, because all these crazy kids are completely different!

Here’s what raising Evie has actually been like thus far (aka fun facts about Evie):

First off, she hates having her hair in her face. But what she hates even more than having her hair in her face, is you brushing her hair back into a ponytail. So, good luck figuring that one out.

Secondly, she hates dresses. All dresses. Rompers are okay. Leggings are better. Shorts are her favorite. I put a dress on Evie to wear to a bridal shower.. DEFCON 1. D put a flower girl dress on Evie for my sister’s wedding.. World War III.

She does love shoes. She likes her New balance because she likes that they have purple and green on them. However, she loves her “sparkly” shoes. Literally pink sandals covered in sparkles. I bought her a pair of plain navy blue tennis shoes and she screamed until I took them off.

Next up, snacks. She loves snacks. And she will share them with you, but only if she can feed them to you. Don’t touch her bowl of Teddy Grahams, she’ll come after you. And if she sees you with a bowl of ice cream, game over.

Also, she hates when her dolls are naked. Which Lee quickly caught on to. So, whenever Lee gets mad at her, he strips her dolls. She will bring you her naked doll to re-dress, and while you are doing so, she will go find Lee and beat on him.

And that is a whole other thing.. the wrestling. She loves to wrestle. She wants nothing more than to roll around on the floor with her Dad and brother and just beat on them. Lovingly, I think.

Typically, I carry her to bed every night. Or I follow her down the hallway when she realizes it’s bed time and takes off running to her room. But, she always gives D and Lee a kiss and a hug beforehand. Always. She loves her boys.

When I first get home from work, she wants me to hold her. I can’t hold her and cook or hold her and stack the dishwasher, I have to sit down and hold her in my lap until she feels like she’s had enough. And if I don’t, she follows me through the house screaming at the top of her lungs. It sounds like it might be sweet, but it’s actually…. a lot. Ha!

I actually expected her to be very empathetic, so it wasn’t surprising when it started manifesting. She can’t watch Lee crying without trying to cheer him up or bursting into tears herself.

She is actually quite perfect. She is the perfect little mix of sugar and spice (did I just say that? kill me).