Double Happiness--adventures with Lily and Elsa: Weekend update

Can you believe it is October already? Where does the time go? We had a really good weekend. We went to dinner parties on Friday and Sunday. And on Saturday, we got to see our good friends Matt and Mo with went to school with Mark at Berkeley, but now work at Penn State. They were up visiting family in NJ.

Going to dinner parties with 3 year olds is an interesting experience. The first one was the welcome reception for all the fellows in the Council of Science and Technology where Mark gets his funding. Luckily it was outside at a professor's house. Lots of fancy finger food and wine glasses. Lily and Elsa were intrigued by the food, but they'd take one bite and try and put it back on the plates. I'd turn my back and find half-eaten finger sandwiches placed back on the platter! Elsa also couldn't understand why she was not allowed to dip her finger into the peanut sauce and lick it off. Luckily, there was a gaggle of children their age. So, the girls spent most of the time running around the yard. We found out that a bunch of the new fellows live in our apartment complex, including a nice young family from Minneapolis. The girls are enchanted by their 3-year old daughter who has flaming red hair. Mark and I are excited to find some fellow Midwesterners around here. What a novelty.

On Sunday, we got invited to celebrate the birthday of one of our neighbors. Their son Jacob is in the girls' class and sometimes we carpool together. The guest list included a bunch of neighbors, humanities post-docs and school families. It was interesting to spend time with a bunch of non-scientists for a change. We also found more new playmates for the girls. Yay! The girls love making new friends. Unlike their mother, who used to hide behind her parents' legs at big parties. The girls are just so excited to play with the other kids. They run right off to join the gang. We had to drag them home.

Some pictures we took before school this morning.

The girls ran to the window this morning to watch our garbage collection. The university has these miniature garbage trucks that drive down our sidewalks. The girls' think the little trucks are extremely cool. (E and L) (L is standing our her tippy-toes, the girls are still very close in height).