The debt that all men pay
More accurately, the debt that all law abiding American citizens pay. Today, April 15th, marks the deadline to file your taxes and poor Autumn is no exception. She wasn't able to escape the tax man this past year.
Our little investor had to pay about 30 dollars in taxes. Autumn filed separately than us to avoid paying her taxes at a higher tax bracket, but what has this world come to when a two year old has to pay the tax man? Either which way, to let the "man" know, Sean wrote in the 'occupation' box; "Two year old girl who is sad she has to pay taxes", with a frowny face drawn next to it. Well on to my next favorite subject, the weather.
Yesterday, we woke up to:
Snow. It is mid April and we still cannot see the grass.
Autumn checking it out.
That mound of snow is still taller than Autumn.
To add insult to injury, after speaking to Grandma Jordan (who is visiting family in Indiana), she just had to rub in all the good weather she is enjoying by sending me this picture:
It looks like a glorious summer day with that blooming crab apple tree. Well, Grandma Jordan, ENJOY your glorious sunshine while we:
Attempt to catch snow flakes on our tongue.
It doesn't look drab or depressing does it? I am smiling!
So what is new with us?
We've graduated Autumn to a real cup. She does quite well with it and she seems to really like drinking out of a real cup. We still keep the sippy cup around, but we are giving her a real cup at meal times.
Also new in our household:
We've been making changes to Autumn's room. We've been slowly replacing things (like the changing table that was still in there- moved it to Emelia's room) in Autumn's room- an upgrading of sorts. She has her very own reading/lounging chair, book case and of course the new:
Comforter. Autumn absolutely loves her new comforter. I had a feeling she would. There was nothing wrong with her old one, but it just didn't suit her personality, it wasn't very girly. Her new comforter is pink and has flowers and every since we switched it out, she actually uses the comforter now and has been sleeping much better (and warmer at night!).
While hanging out in Autumn's room, she had a conversation with Elmo.
Apparently it involved shoving her hand down Elmo's throat.
After Autumn threw just about everything off her bed, she hung out with:
Her dad for a little bit.
Sean was drawing her pictures and one of his favorite things to draw for Autumn is:
A scary spider, or in Autumn language, "Gary bider." Cindy doesn't know this yet, but Autumn has developed quite a fear of spiders and I totally blame Cindy for it. When Autumn was really little, spiders didn't bother her at all. As a matter of fact, I had to stop her from eating one when she was around a year old. THEN!!! One day, while Cindy and Dylan were visiting, a spider crawled through my living room (which happens frequently during certain times of the year in Alaska- all the spiders move indoors for a bit) and Cindy came unglued. Autumn and I killed the spider, but I'm almost certain that Autumn picked up her fear of spiders from that incident!!! At least that is my story!!
Sean and I have been making lots of progress in Emelia's room. Don't laugh when you see this photo because believe me, if you had seen the room before, you would know this is a marked improvement.
Emelia's room.
We got the dresser put up, but there were some problems with it.
Sean had to do some work on it. Please don't ask me what because I have no idea, but avoiding sending the dresser back was paramount.
Looks to me like I married quite the handy man.
The finished product.
We still need to purchase a crib mattress, put the crib up, buy Emelia some clothes, decorate the room, pack a hospital bag (for both of us) and the list goes on. With T minus 6 weeks, we really need to get moving on this!
No blog post is complete without a food topic!
One of the nights this past week we had Dr Pepper Ribs, Twice baked sweet potatoes, and Fried Okra.
It was delicious. Sean smoked those ribs indoors for a few minutes with a smoker contraption that he designed, then took them outside to finish up on the grill. We used one of our favorite sauces:
Marion-Blackberry Chipotle sauce.
The next dish, I have no idea what to call it or how to make it, but I can say with absolute certainty, it was outstanding!
My closest guess would be Braised chicken with gravy, Gremolata and smashed potatoes. Sean says I should add this in here, you see those things on the mashed potatoes? That is the chicken skin. Sean pulled them off the chicken before cooking them, fried them up, salted them and put them atop our smashed potatoes. I'm almost ashamed to admit it, but it was very delicious. I love being married to such a talented chef.
Sean starts back to work next week. I have mixed feelings about this. Autumn and I will be able to get back on our routine (we've been missing out on going to the gym and going on regular play dates), but it means spending less time with Sean. I guess leave couldn't last forever. In a few more weeks, Sean will be off again to welcome Emelia into the world. I'm just very grateful that we got to spend so much time together even though we didn't get to go on a beach vacation.
Until next time:
See you from Snowy Alaska.
Our little investor had to pay about 30 dollars in taxes. Autumn filed separately than us to avoid paying her taxes at a higher tax bracket, but what has this world come to when a two year old has to pay the tax man? Either which way, to let the "man" know, Sean wrote in the 'occupation' box; "Two year old girl who is sad she has to pay taxes", with a frowny face drawn next to it. Well on to my next favorite subject, the weather.
Yesterday, we woke up to:
Snow. It is mid April and we still cannot see the grass.
Autumn checking it out.
That mound of snow is still taller than Autumn.
To add insult to injury, after speaking to Grandma Jordan (who is visiting family in Indiana), she just had to rub in all the good weather she is enjoying by sending me this picture:
It looks like a glorious summer day with that blooming crab apple tree. Well, Grandma Jordan, ENJOY your glorious sunshine while we:
Attempt to catch snow flakes on our tongue.
It doesn't look drab or depressing does it? I am smiling!
So what is new with us?
We've graduated Autumn to a real cup. She does quite well with it and she seems to really like drinking out of a real cup. We still keep the sippy cup around, but we are giving her a real cup at meal times.
Also new in our household:
We've been making changes to Autumn's room. We've been slowly replacing things (like the changing table that was still in there- moved it to Emelia's room) in Autumn's room- an upgrading of sorts. She has her very own reading/lounging chair, book case and of course the new:
Comforter. Autumn absolutely loves her new comforter. I had a feeling she would. There was nothing wrong with her old one, but it just didn't suit her personality, it wasn't very girly. Her new comforter is pink and has flowers and every since we switched it out, she actually uses the comforter now and has been sleeping much better (and warmer at night!).
While hanging out in Autumn's room, she had a conversation with Elmo.
Apparently it involved shoving her hand down Elmo's throat.
After Autumn threw just about everything off her bed, she hung out with:
Her dad for a little bit.
Sean was drawing her pictures and one of his favorite things to draw for Autumn is:
A scary spider, or in Autumn language, "Gary bider." Cindy doesn't know this yet, but Autumn has developed quite a fear of spiders and I totally blame Cindy for it. When Autumn was really little, spiders didn't bother her at all. As a matter of fact, I had to stop her from eating one when she was around a year old. THEN!!! One day, while Cindy and Dylan were visiting, a spider crawled through my living room (which happens frequently during certain times of the year in Alaska- all the spiders move indoors for a bit) and Cindy came unglued. Autumn and I killed the spider, but I'm almost certain that Autumn picked up her fear of spiders from that incident!!! At least that is my story!!
Sean and I have been making lots of progress in Emelia's room. Don't laugh when you see this photo because believe me, if you had seen the room before, you would know this is a marked improvement.
Emelia's room.
We got the dresser put up, but there were some problems with it.
Sean had to do some work on it. Please don't ask me what because I have no idea, but avoiding sending the dresser back was paramount.
Looks to me like I married quite the handy man.
The finished product.
We still need to purchase a crib mattress, put the crib up, buy Emelia some clothes, decorate the room, pack a hospital bag (for both of us) and the list goes on. With T minus 6 weeks, we really need to get moving on this!
No blog post is complete without a food topic!
One of the nights this past week we had Dr Pepper Ribs, Twice baked sweet potatoes, and Fried Okra.
It was delicious. Sean smoked those ribs indoors for a few minutes with a smoker contraption that he designed, then took them outside to finish up on the grill. We used one of our favorite sauces:
Marion-Blackberry Chipotle sauce.
The next dish, I have no idea what to call it or how to make it, but I can say with absolute certainty, it was outstanding!
My closest guess would be Braised chicken with gravy, Gremolata and smashed potatoes. Sean says I should add this in here, you see those things on the mashed potatoes? That is the chicken skin. Sean pulled them off the chicken before cooking them, fried them up, salted them and put them atop our smashed potatoes. I'm almost ashamed to admit it, but it was very delicious. I love being married to such a talented chef.
Sean starts back to work next week. I have mixed feelings about this. Autumn and I will be able to get back on our routine (we've been missing out on going to the gym and going on regular play dates), but it means spending less time with Sean. I guess leave couldn't last forever. In a few more weeks, Sean will be off again to welcome Emelia into the world. I'm just very grateful that we got to spend so much time together even though we didn't get to go on a beach vacation.
Until next time:
See you from Snowy Alaska.
Comments
Two LOVE Emelia's new dresser, very cute! Chris had to be handy man on Izzy's new dresser as well because it was not going back to the store either.
Three, how much do you think Sean would charge if I hired him to come cook at our house too??? I'm really tired of cooking!
Four, I'm going to Once Upon a Child sometime next week if you wanna come with and browes the clothes.
And LAST can't WAIT to see you guys tomorrow!
Your Friends,
Jenny & Izzy