Sisters

People have told me that there must be a little baby Haight mold, because all my girls look so much a like.  They do definitely look like sisters.  Here are a few pictures:

#1

 #2

Can you tell these are two different babies?  #1 is Avery and #2 is Riley!  Pretty close.
Now for the Sophie comparison.  I took #3 of Riley because the way Lance was holding her reminded me so much of #4, a picture we had taken of Sophie around the same age.

#3

#4

And then of course there is the comparison between Sophie and Avery which I've done before here.

So I guess they do all look pretty similar when they are born, but they start getting their own looks as they get older.  I guess since all my girls come from the same mold, I'm glad it's a cute one! 

Things I Love...

Of course my family and the gospel are the things I love the most, but this list is different.  This list is the things I love that don't really matter. They just make my life easier, happier, prettier, tastier and so on.  Some things you might know about me and some you might not!


1. Running and the body I had (and will have again) when I ran my marathon.  I'm up to a 5k again and am actually beating my old pace.

2. Skype.  I can talk with my dear friend Jen just like she were right in my house, instead of a world away in China.  I really love that.  It's also great to talk to parents and grandparents.  Love that technology!

3. These great cupcake boxes.  So cute! I bought these and made cupcakes just so I could give them away in these boxes.  I guess I made cupcakes to eat them too, but they are even better in these little containers.

4. Heated mattress pads with dual controls.  Lance likes it cold, I like it super hot!  Perfect solution!  There is nothing like getting into a toasty warm bed on a cold night.

5. My Bialetti Hot Chocolate Maker.  I love using the Starbucks classic cocoa you buy at costco in the can, mixing it up in my hot chocolate maker and then adding pumpkin spice creamer! Yum!!

6. M.A.C Paint Pot.  Awesome as a base to eye shadow or to use as a base color by itself.

7. Psych...best show on TV!

8. This dress.  I just bought it from Nordstrom because when I put it on my wish list it was $148. With the the half yearly sale only $68.  

9. Amazon.com ~ wow am I addicted!  I think you can find anything at Amazon and generally at a cheaper price than anywhere else. I think it's almost too easy though to buy what you want.  With my amazon prime free two day shipping it's instant gratification at it's best!  

10. The smell of leather in a new car.  Aaahhh!  That's what Lance's new car smells like and every time I sit in it, I just take a deep breath and smile!

11. Pretty wrapping on packages.  A pretty outside just makes the inside so much more exciting.  

12. Burke Williams Spa.  If you've never been you should go!  It's not just a spa, it's an experience.  It's hard to describe, but it's the atmosphere and the attention to detail.  You can spend time in the sauna, steam room, and hot tub before you get your treatment to really get relaxed and ready.  The amenities are unlike any other spa I've ever been too.  I can't wait until December 16th!  

13. Recchiuti Chocolate.  I discovered this chocolate store during my walking chocolate tour of San Francisco.  They have these burnt caramel hazelnuts that are covered in a thin coat of dark chocolate.  They are amazingly good!

14. Kitchen things.  I love any kind of kitchen utensil, bakeware, or gadget.  Williams-Sonoma is my mecca.  I love it and want to own everything in the store.  In actuality, I do own a lot of it and people who know me, know mine is a go to house for unique cooking and baking things.  There's only been one time someone has asked me to borrow something that I didn't have. It was a soup tureen and I still feel like my kitchen isn't complete because I still don't have one. 

15.  Hydrangeas. My favorite flower.

16. Fabric.  I love going to Calico Corners and just looking at their fabric. I don't even need it most of the time.  I just like to look at it and touch it.

I'm sure I could keep going, but I don't have the time.  Just a few things that make my life happy!  What things do you love?

Halloween Week

We did a lot of dressing up for Halloween this year!  I was pretty ready for the celebrations to be over by November 1st! But we had so much fun and I love seeing my girls get so excited about something and feeling so beautiful.

This year Sophie was an Ice Princess (a costume she picked in July and never changed her mind about), Avery was Rapunzel, and Riley was a Pumpkin Ballerina (Avery's costume from her first Halloween).

Our first dress up was at Sophie's enrichment class, Wednesday the 26th.

Our next dress up was Avery's preschool carnival, Thursday the 27th.

Then on Friday the 28th, Sophie got to dress up for her dance class and we had the ward Trunk or Treat.

Saturday and Sunday we had a break from costumes, but Monday the 31st we had Avery's dress up for dance class and then Halloween trick or treating.

Clever

We actually had a few days of rain this month.  A little "trick" right before Halloween that we might actually have a real fall....didn't happen. Anyway, on one of those wonderful rainy days, here was my conversation with Avery:
Avery: "Mom, can I go jump on the trampoline?"
Me: "No, it's raining outside."
Avery: "Please, mom.  Can't I jump on the trampoline?"
Me: "No, your clothes will get all wet."
Avery:  "Then I'll put on my swimming suit."
How could I say no to that? :)

Speaking of Falling Out...

The tooth fairy visited our house for the first time this week!  Yep, Sophie lost her first tooth.  Surprisinlgy  enough, she wasn't scare of it coming out and actually wiggled it out on her own.

She requested a gold Sacagawea gold dollar coin from the tooth fairy.  Unfortunately, the falling out happened at night and that particular coin wasn't one the tooth fairy could round up.  But she was able to scrounge up a gold dollar coin with William Henry Harrison on it.  It came from Sophie's piggy bank, but our plan was to secretly exchange that coin with a Sacagawea one the following day, and hopefully, she'd never even realize.  The problem was, at 1 o'clock in the morning when little miss Sophie decided to come into our bedroom to show us the coin the tooth fairy had left, she turned it over and asked me to read the name of the person whose face was on the coin. The second I said, "William Henry Harrison", she responded with, "That's just like the one I have in my piggy bank."  Still not sure why a 5 year old would remember him on the back of a coin she hadn't seen in over a year, but nevertheless, we now had a little problem.  We couldn't just exchange it without her knowing.  So the next day, Lance, I mean the tooth fairy, went and got a Sacagewea gold dollar coin.  We had Sophie put the gold coin she had "received" under her pillow again with a note to the tooth fairy asking if she would exchange coins with her.  She did of course, William Henry went back in her piggy bank and everybody came out a winner!

Falling Out

So this may be a gross picture for you to look at, but just imagine how gross it is to me!  This beautiful pile of hair is what I am currently losing on a DAILY basis!  It's that super fun post pregnancy hair loss!  Maybe the fact that my hair is pretty long makes the pile look worse.  But regardless of that fact, there is in reality enough hair falling out every day that I actually have bald spots.  I even looked into Rogaine for women, but it can take up to 4 months to see results.  I hope and pray that in 4 months my hair will be growing back on its own!  Until then, if  you see me run my fingers through my hair and scream you know why.

It's crazy all the things we do for these sweet little babies.  I can list hair loss for sure, weight gain~30 pounds worth, and even a lovely little "skin-stache". What is a skin-stache you ask?  Oh, only a darkening of the skin above my upper lip that looks just like a mustache only it's not hair, it's just skin! So pretty!  Someday, my body will be back to normal and all this will be a funny and yet horrifying memory, right?  Besides, she's worth it! :)

And Ponies Too!

For many years in a row we used to make pony rides at Lemos Farm in Half Moon Bay a part of our Halloween celebration, so when Avery couldn't ride the horses at Western Trail Rides, I couldn't resist loading the kids up for the day and driving to the coast! The weather was PERFECT and the traffic was light!  What more could you ask for?  With BBF Sara along for the fun, the girls (and I) had a great time!

More Horses

I love Groupon!  I get their emails every day and I love scoring a great deal!  Earlier this year I bought a Groupon for half off horseback riding at Western Trail Rides in Sunol...only $30 for two people to ride for a half hour.  Because of our crazy summer, it took us a lot longer to use it than we thought, but we finally did!  Only Sophie got to do it because you had to be 5, but she had her dad as her riding partner and loved every second of it.  Avery, Riley and I hung out back at the stables and petted the horses there.  Such a great place!

A New Family Pastime

You're going to think we are crazy, but the saying "Don't knock it 'til you try it" will come into play here. We have decided we love going to the horse races!  How did this come about you ask?  Well...Lance's Lieutenant, Frank, is really into the races, betting on them even.  He told Lance about a thing called "Off the Grid" that was going to be at the races for a few Saturdays in September.  "Off the Grid" is basically a huge gathering of food trucks of every variety.  Usually it is at the Presidio on Friday nights, but for this event the different trucks would be rotating through each weekend at Golden Gate Fields, our neighborhood horse racing venue.  My parents were in town and we were looking for something fun to do so we thought we'd check it out, the food trucks, that is.

It was $6 for adults to get in and then you could go crazy.  My father went under the pretense that you paid your $6 and then just went from truck to truck consuming all the food your stomach could handle or that your arms could carry. Not true, but at least it got him there. You do have to buy the food from the trucks, but wow, were there some choices!  There were breakfast food trucks, Filipino food trucks, falafel trucks, hamburger trucks, creme brûlée trucks, cupcake trucks, hawaiian food trucks and so many others to choose from.  I'd say about 30 in all.  It was fun just exploring the trucks, to say nothing about eating the food.

But the surprise of the day was how fun watching the horse racing was.  Of course we never bet on any of the races.  We just cheered as the horses ran by us so fast they created a breeze!  Sophie and Avery got to go in the stables and see the horses and jockeys up close. Riley got to be cuddled by Frank's  wife. In the crowd there were a lot of young families (another shocker).  It was perfect weather, right there on the bay!  We had a great time and are looking forward to our next trip!  You should join us!

Any Resemblance?

The second I saw this picture of Riley...

I thought of this picture of Lance!

Of course I knew all of his girls are born looking like him, but this one even makes the same facial expressions! Love it!