Tax Returns

Evan's sister, Sara, decided to spend (part of) her tax return on a flight to visit us!  Yahoo for tax returns.  Sara's baby Charlie was born only a couple weeks after we moved to Michigan so this was the first time we got to meet him.  Evan worked a bunch the week they were here and I didn't get a single picture of "uncle Evan" and Charlie. BOO!  Most of the week involved hanging out while one of the kids was napping, but we did make it out of the house a few times...even though the weather was crazy all week.  Cold/snowing, sunny/warm, windy/rainy which involved our power going out for several hours.

Meet 10 month old Charlie

Autumn stopped taking baths after visiting her cousins in North Carolina who take showers.  She has now rediscovered a love for the bathtub.  Charlie was a little frightened of Autumn's "Spunk".

Charlie and his snot bubble!  We ventured to the park one afternoon, because it was warm.  By the time we walked there it had gotten chilly.

Autumn and our neighbor "Kate".  Autumn says "Kate" and points to her apartment whenever we go outside.

Autumn outgrew her tennis shoes, so she was sporting her church shoes for a few days before her new ones got here.  Autumn enjoyed using Charlie's stroller, sitting in his car seat, and using the high chair we borrowed for Charlie.

We took the kiddos to the "Hands-On" museum in Ann Arbor.  They had a great preschool section.  Autumn really liked the little staircase with the railing that she could hang on to.  The only problem is now she thinks she can use the railing to climb the stairs up to our apartment...which doesn't work the same when you have to stand on your tip-toes.

Charlie's favorite was a trail thingy that plastic balls traveled on.  You could pull levers, pull switches, etc. to change the course the ball was traveling.

Light table with magnetic shapes.

Autumn also enjoyed splashing in the water.  (Check out that crazy face!)

Another one of Autumn's favorite things was this magnetic thingy?  The adults thought it was cool that her hair clip kept getting stuck and even got "ripped" out of her hair by the magnet.

Play time at home.  Autumn likes to rock her baby back and forth if I sing, "rock-a-bye baby"

Autumn had some good lessons in sharing.  By the end of the week she screamed less and didn't hit Charlie as much.

This is one of my favorite pictures of the week.  I was trying to get a picture of the two of them and obviously Autumn didn't want to.  That kid is always in motion.

One of Autumn's "new things" is playing with my costume jewelry.  So Charlie joined in one morning while the moms got ready for the day.

Saturday Evan finally had a day off so we went to the mall play area.  Autumn just wanted to sit in Charlie's stroller.  Charlie had fun playing though.  After the mall there were many naps to be had.  We attempted to visit a "Diners Drive ins and Dives" restaurant, but after getting lost and waiting for over 45 minutes at the hole in the wall restaurant with no waiting area with two babies we came home!

Playing with the plastic food.  The kids loved when Sara would hunk the fruit at them!

Almost exactly 6 months apart and pretty much the same size.

Playing outside in the nice weather.  She is quite the rascal.  I thought she looked kinda funny this day so I took a picture.  She always insists on using the neighbor's sippy cup!  Please notice despite her dorky hat and her belly showing, her new shoes arrived from aunt Jess and I LOVE them.

 Love the matching grump faces from these cousins

Last photo before we had to say goodbye :(

Another one of those photos

Oh my Autumn bottom!  She is so full of spunk.  Yes, sometimes I wish she would sit on the floor and play with a bucket of rice for 30 minutes so I could clear off the kitchen table that has squished peanut butter sandwich, gram cracker-strawberry-water paste and whatever that goop is that the Tornado Autumn created 2 hours earlier, but I am so grateful she is not boring. 

The following photo just about sums up our days lately!

1. I am SO ready for Spring.  After Autumn spilled cinnamon all over herself while we were making oatmeal cookies I changed her into this super cute romper.  Since it is still way cold I put this sweater on top of her bare shoulders. (I'm sure she'll be wearing this a lot this summer IF it ever gets warm and you can see the full cuteness of it.)

2. Autumn is OBSESSED with shoes.  She loves to sit on the floor and put her own shoes on (always on the right foot, but can be a left or right shoe)  She also tromps around the house in mine or Evan's shoes as well.  It is super funny to watch her "run" in my wedges.

3. I decided to mix it up today and try a new activity.  Painting Autumn's toe nails.  I used the quickest drying paint I have.  I only got one foot painted before I gave up.  All that blue on her hands is nail polish;)  (I later got her other toes painted and she kept trying to eat it off.  Silly girl!  I think she was doing it because she was getting a reaction out of me.

4.  It is near IMPOSSIBLE to get a picture of this very active girl who is in love with looking at videos of herself on my camera!

Easter

This Easter, I tried to do things for Autumn instead of for myself.  We have early church so we waited until after church and her nap to give her, her Easter basket.  She got a few things and NO candy (wow! what a mean mom! Or am I nice cuz I'm really looking out for her health. Hmm...)  Then we went outside to get some family Easter photos. After a glorious little tromp around the courtyard (it was 60 degrees today Hooray! Tomorrow is suppose to be in the low 30s again BOO!). We went to Evan's co-worker's house for a traditional Easter ham/potato dinner and egg hunt.

 I bought her an Easter hat like my mom bought me and my sisters, but it didn't match Autumn's outfit so she didn't wear it today.

She got a few new books I found at my new favorite thrift store.

Autumn isn't looking, but at least Evan and I look good:) 

 This is for my new years resolution of taking more pictures of myself!

 Autumn loves animals.

Autumn did surprisingly well at on the hunt.  She figured things out pretty quickly.  I love watching her learn and explore new things. 

Here is a group shot of the girls on the hunt.  We got a couple pictures and then Autumn decided she was done taking pictures.  This photo was my favorite!

Dying Eggs

Evan and I share a car.  It's the worst.  I take Evan to work about once a week so I can have the car to do errands.  It isn't a big deal to take him to work, but it is a pain guessing what time he'll be done and when he needs to be picked up (it usually involves a lot of waiting around).  Anyhow last week I decided to barge in on my friend, Charidee, who lives right by the hospital and wait it out for Evan.  It worked out rather nicely.  So last night after I picked Evan up from work we went to Charidee's house.  She fed us.  Then we decorated eggs...

I had a feeling Autumn would make a mess so I brought an old shirt for her to wear.

This is Autumn sticking her hand in the shaving cream.  It was used to get a fancy marble effect on the eggs.  I'm pretty sure it was from Pinterest.  It was fun, but doesn't hold the same nostalgic feelings as good old PAAS.

Enjoying the shaving cream painting...

A little too much.  I'm sure I'm saying something like, "not in your mouth!"

Evan thought Autumn looked like a ghost from Zelda that just hovered around, because you couldn't see her feel while walking in my shirt.

Time for the good 'ol PAAS.  Autumn was not very delicate with the eggs, but I think she really liked splashing around.

(check out her eggs in the carton, most of them are missing parts of their shells;)

Autumn and her friends, McKenlee and Ainslee.

Evan thought Autumn looked cute today so he took a picture.  She looks like she working the runway, but really she's galloping towards the camera.

Artist

Autumn has taken to drawing lately.  Look how she even holds the window marker like a big girl.  She also likes to put stickers on papers.  So far markers/stickers have stayed on paper and haven't gotten on her too much.

Birthday week

My older sister always teases me because my birthday lasts forever.  She'd complain that I would get a whole week as a birth"day".  I never understood where she got that from, until this year...Although I would prefer one grad explosion of a birthday day it was kinda nice to drag things out this year.  Birthday just aren't the same when you're older.  I just thought it was because adults didn't like being "old".  Lets face it I'm not old.  I think they are mostly lame because your mom isn't there to wake you up in the morning (camera ready if you're Kenz) make you breakfast, new school clothes ready, school friends wishing you a "happy birthday", mom makes your favorite dinner and dessert, cards from aunts and uncles (really? Just cuz I'm an adult do the birthday stickers from Aunt Carrie have to stop?).  Anyhow this is how my birthday week went.

WEDNESDAY:Actual birthday

I took Evan to work so I could have the car.  Autumn took a super long nap.  We wondered around Target for 2 hours.  I finally spent my Christmas money and bought myself a new dress and pair of shoes.  Then we raced home to get ready to go to the temple (on your birthday really?-It was one of those we need to go to the temple. NOW. type of situations, and it just happened to be my birthday oh well)  I grabbed pizza after dropping Autumn off at a friend's house and we went to the world's smallest temple (Ok I made that part up but it really is tiny,smaller than the stake center next door).  We came home and video chatted with some of the family.  Then Autumn woke up because she was hungry so she helped me open up a present from my parents and one from Evan. No cake No singing.

 THURSDAY:  I got a present in the mail from Evan.  He even wrapped it!

 Bowling shoes.  We were joking around a few weeks ago saying how it would be much more economical if we owned bowling shoes, so we wouldn't have to pay to rent shoes every time we went bowling.  (I think the last time we went bowling was over two years ago and we didn't even pay for it.  My dad did.)  So I foresee some bowling dates in our future.  Hopefully I won't get beat up for my sweet kicks.

 FRIDAY: more mail.  My parents sent me a pair of Jeans!  I opened them as I was dipping chocolates for my birthday party.

 SATURDAY: Birthday Party.  Pet peeve (I have so many I should write a book)  I hate when people take a bunch of pictures of food at parties.  Especially on Facebook.  They'll have an album called, "Liddy's baby shower" and 95% of the pictures will be the food table, 4% of the pictures will be the decorations not on the food table and the other 1% would be a picture of the host of the shower, most of the time leaving out a picture of the person the shower was supposedly for.  Well after this party I start to see why.  I wanted to make my favorite desserts, well they were all SUPER time consuming and they look pretty so I took pictures of them.  Not in a "look how great I am" way, but in a "I want to remember what we had at my party" way.  But I will brag about the Barbie.  I got a brand new Barbie for $2.50 from Toys R Us because I had a coupon. Boo YAY

Chocolate Carmel Pretzels and homemade Butterfingers

Oreo Truffles, Frosted Animal cookie Truffles, Brownies 

So the theme of the party was Barbie and Ken.  I was reading in a magazine that Ken's birthday was March 13.  I thought to myself, "how have I gone almost 26 years and not known I shared a birthday with Ken!  We should have a party."  So we did.  I asked the guests to dress up as Barbie and Ken.  Some did some didn't.

Evan posing in the "Barbie Box"

I won't be going blonde anytime soon!

Winners of the costume contest.  I wish I had a full body shot.  Barbie had some sweet metallic tights and Ken had some sweeter neon yellow socks.

It took my over an hour to hang the crate paper.  I made a blueberry/spinach/banana smoothie to even out all the sweets. There was also a fruit platter (with dipping chocolate).

We played one of my favorite group games, "Four men on a couch."  The woman won all 3 rounds,but we cheated.

SUNDAY:  Since I was super busy ALL day getting ready for my party I forgot to get the mail.  So on Sunday after church we discovered yet another present for me in the mail box.  A sun hat.  Too bad it is snowing.  Maybe one day it will be sunny again.  Today is Monday who knows what the mail man will bring...Maybe my birth"day" really will last a whole week.