"Please Bless That Daddy Will Win."

Yesterday when we were heading out to watch Taber run a local 10K Teya suggested we say a prayer. We thought it was a very sweet idea so we stopped and let her say it. Her prayer was simple, "Please bless that Daddy will win."

So the pressure was on that morning. Not that Taber expected to win since running is a hobby and not something he has time to train for extensively. Still, he wanted to do his best for his number 1 fan who really believed her Daddy could win. His goals that morning were to finish in the top 50, under 50 minutes with an 8 min/mile pace. When we saw him at mile 2 he looked on track to meet his goals.

The weather was a little chilly, but the girls were bundled up and excited to be outside to cheer on their dad.

The race ran through some scenic trails at a beautiful park called Mine Falls near our house. It was a really cool place for the girls to explore while we walked to different spectator points.

I was worried they might get bored but the leaves and rocks and sticks and logs provided plenty of entertainment and photo ops for these two.

Here they are waiting at a little waterfall bridge for Taber to come through.

It didn't take long before we saw him. This was near the end of the race and he was definitely ahead of the big middle pack crowd.

The girls cheered loudly when they saw him and then after a little more exploring and tree hugging we cut across to the finish line.

And there he is coming down the home stretch. He finished in 48:09. Almost 2 minutes faster than his 50 min goal time at a 7:46 min/mile pace which was also well under his 8 min/mile goal. He was also the 40th finisher which met his goal for finishing in the top 50. Teya excitedly asked, "DID HE WIN?!" And I said, "Yes he did, because he beat his goals and did his very best." That was good enough for her and she ran to find him and give him the biggest victor's hug ever.

It was a great morning and always so fun to support our main man in his running adventures. I love what a good example it is for the kids and can't wait till next year when hopefully I'll be back out there running with him. : )

Exceptionally Awesome House Guests

A week and a half ago our good friends, the Draschil's, came out and stayed with us while Joseph was doing Business school interviews at Babson and Dartmouth.

They earned "exceptionally awesome house guest" status by cooking for us (3 times!), helping set up our house for the Halloween party, filling up our gas, cleaning up and doing dishes after every meal, introducing us to a new world of iPhone apps, and thoroughly entertaining our kids. Totally above and beyond awesome. : )

It was also fun that Melinda and I are both pregnant at the same time again (her daughter Brielle was born a few weeks after Brinley) So we could totally relate on all the pregnancy issues of the glorious 3rd trimester.

Anyway, here are some of the pics from their visit:

The day after they got here they were gracious enough to be my party slaves and helped with all the Halloween party prep. They impressed everyone with their awesome Monster's inc. costumes and their mad Minute-to-Win it Skills.

On Saturday after Joseph's info session at Babson we all went down to Boston to the Halloween Fest at the Prudential Center. They had tons of great activities for kids:

Fun character's the kids could pose with.

A car they were given free reign to graffiti. Total kid heaven.

Now we're just afraid to ever let then near our cars with a real marker!

Free face painting (which Teya LOVED, if you can't tell from the pictures)

The three girls with their face painting designs.

(had to get them matching big sister shirts too since they will all be big sisters very soon!)

And Pumpkin decorating.

It was a great afternoon and so neat to have such a big kid friendly event down in Boston.

Other highlights from their visit:

Making sugar cookies with the kiddos. It was messy, and the cookies weren't pretty, but they tasted awesome and the girls had fun so that's what counts : )

Apple Farm visit: I know, I know, we've been there a ton this fall, but the apple donuts are awesome and fresh picked apples are the BEST!

5 mile run for the boys. Yeah, they're hardcore like that.

And possibly my favorite highlight: On their last night here we all stayed up really late laughing and chatting. I was worried I would pay for it the next day but to my surprise I blissfully slept in the next morning. I was shocked when I finally woke around 9am and wondered how on earth my girls hadn't woken me up before that. When I went downstairs I found them wide awake and being thoroughly entertained by Joseph's iPad. Apparently they had been up since 6:30!! But he wanted us to sleep in so he got up with them and kept them entertained for 2 and half hours. And as if that wasn't enough he also made German pancakes with homemade syrup. Um yeah, like I said, exceptionally awesome house guests!

Mermaids, Fairies and Halloween!

When I asked Teya what she wanted to be for Halloween this year she said a Mermaid (of course!) I tried to talk her into something different since she was a mermaid last year but her heart was set on it. Luckily she consented to be the Barbie Mermaid instead of Ariel so we could at least have pictures of her in two different mermaid costumes.

My other girly girl wanted to be a Fairy. And a very cute fairy at that : )

They were excited to pose in front of our party backdrop. My pretty little princesses.

And one more from Taber's phone. I love that Brinley still does the scrunchie cheese face!

We took them to the ward Halloween party on Saturday. They had a chili cook off, dancing, and cake decorating. Every table had 5 minutes to decorate a cake. Teya really got into it and was beaming when our table one "Most Artistic."

Then we headed off to decorate our rooms for the trick or treaters. Someone snapped this shot of me on my way to decorate and it's the only picture I made it into that night, so here's the proof that I was there too ; )

Taber took the girls on the trick or treating rounds. It's so fun now that they both know the drill and can cruise from door to door without any help. (well, besides a few suggestions on what candies to pick. I mean come on! Brinley kept trying to grab Whoppers when there were Reese's peanut butter cups in there! Someone had to guide her towards the light)

Love this shot of Brinley and her preschool buddy William. So cute!

After all the fun Teya fell asleep in the car with a sucker in her mouth! How do you fall asleep with candy in your mouth?!

Brinley saw us laughing and taking pictures of Teya so she said, 'Take a picture of me!" Then she pretended to sleep with a sucker in her mouth too. What a ham!

When we got home Teya woke up and the girls started counting and sorting their loot.
This year they looked over each other's goodies and started the bartering process. Somehow I have a feeling Teya's getting the better end of the trades.

It was an awesome Halloween, but all good things must come to an end. Finally Taber said no more candy for the night and this was Brinley's face after the announcement.

Minute to Win it Videos

First Video has Junk in your trunk, Dizzy Mummy, Elephant March, Hanky Panky, and Suck it up

Halloween Party Games Part 1 from Rigg Family on Vimeo.

Second Video with Nose Dive, Bite Me, Stack Attack, Don't blow it, and Face the Cookie

Halloween Party Games part 2 from Rigg Family on Vimeo.

Our 1st Annual Halloween Costume Party

Last weekend we threw our 1st annual costume party for adults. It turned out to be a huge success and I owe a lot of that to my awesome friend Mandy Pinneo, who is the queen of Halloween and coached me (through emails since she lives in California) on how to throw an awesome costume party. So thank you Mandy and thank you to everyone who came and made it so much fun!! Here are some pictures of the great costumes. We made it a contest so I saved the winners for the end!

Taber and I hosted the party as a pirate and his booty

Gangsters, Scooby doo,

Mike and Boo's Door from Monster's Inc., (excellent use of Mel's pregnant belly) and more pirates.

Facebook page, Joseph Smith and Emma,

Loofa sponge and Angel Moroni, Little Red riding hood and the wolf (after the attack)

Paul Bunyan and Babe, Fairy and Dilbert,

Legend of Zelda, and witch couple.

Skunks, Stairway to heaven and highway to hell,

Trinity and Neo from the Matrix, Magician and Rabbit in the hat.

The elders (as themselves) Marcie's 9 month prego belly trying to "jailbreak" and the warden, Flower and bee, psycho surgeon and "costumetic surgery" gone bad.

And now for the winners! The 3rd place prize went to Brandon and Laura with their awesome cotton candy and popcorn costumes.

2nd place went to Kendall and Kenta Hood, who played on their names and her very pregnant condition to be MotherHOOD Barbie (pregnant and barefoot edition) and her Ken-ta doll : )

And the grand prize went to Jenn and Casey with their amazing Grinch and Cindy Lou Hoo costumes. She seriously looks like she just walked off the Grinch movie set!! Perfection!

It was an awesome night and I was so happy to see how everyone really got dressed up. We ate lots of good food and played some great games (which can be seen in the post below) It was just a lot of fun and we can't wait to do it again next year!

Minute to Win it Party Games

The main game we played at our Halloween party was a home version of Minute to Win It. If you've never seen the show you should check it out on Youtube, pretty hilarious! Anyway, We had 4 teams and each team would send a person up to compete in physical challenges. If they could complete the challenge in less than a minute they scored a point for their team. I'm going to make a video of it to post later but here are some pictures to give you an idea.

Hanky Panky: Contestants had to empty an entire box of Kleenex, one tissue at a time using only one hand, in less than a minute.

Don't Blow It: Contestants had to blow up a balloon then use the air from deflating it to push 15 cups of the table.

Dizzy Mummy: Contestant had to unravel an entire roll of toilet paper using only their body without tearing the paper.

Suck it up: Contestants had to use a straw to suck up M&M's and place them on top of 4 straws. This one was super hard and one of my favorites to watch! Amazingly everyone pulled it off, some with just 1 second to spare!

Stack Attack: Contestants had to build a cup tower with 28 cups then collapse it and re-stack the cups in less than a minute.

Bite Me: Contestants had to use their mouths to transfer 5 bags (cut to increasingly lower heights ) to a table without touching any body part to the ground but their feet.

Elephant March: Contestants had to wear a pantyhose on their heads with a ball at the end and use it to knock over 8 bottles of water.

Junk in your Trunk: Contestant had to shake, jump, wiggle and contort to get 8 ping pong balls out of a Kleenex box that was tied to their waist.

Nose Dive: Contestants had to transfer 5 cotton balls from one end of the table to the other using petroleum jelly and their noses.

Face the Cookie: Contestants had to use the muscles in their face to slide a cookie from their forehead into their mouth without using their hands.

I think the pictures speak for themselves on how much fun this game was! Hopefully I can get the video up soon so you can see it in all it's live hilarious action! Good good times ; )

Fall in New England

Fall is at it's height in New England and I still can't get used to how amazingly beautiful it is. EVERYWHERE you go there are big, bright trees bursting with color. In Utah we had pretty colors but you had to drive up to the mountains to really see them. Out here we have them right in our backyard. Here's a few pics I took, they don't do it justice but you get the idea.

Here's a shot of our backyard

Another backyard view

This is right at the entrance of our neighborhood

This is as you're leaving our neighborhood.

The coolest thing is that there are so many trees here that no matter where you go you are spoiled by the incredible view. I wish I could take pictures of the freeways and the streets, so so pretty!