Happy Halloween!

(Lydia eighteen months trick or treating as a Garden Gnome)

(Lydia and I going door to door, we had to take the car)

Sunday night was Beggar's Night and Lydia's first time really trick or treating. Last year we just went to a couple houses to say hi to our neighbors. She was totally into it. I was surprised since she's only eighteen months. The first house our little garden gnome just walked right in, it was so funny and caught our elderly neighbor by surprise. After that she got the jist and was ready to pick a piece of candy and say thank you. We were only going to go to a few houses again this year but ended up hitting up our entire street becasue she was having a blast!

Rachel Pierce

rpierce@myabc5.com

(Lydia just walking right into the first house...she didn't know.)

We love the Pumpkin Patch!

We have turned the Pumpkin Patch into a tradition. We have gone to Howell's Tree Farm for several years. The boys love it and apparently so do thousands of other city dwellers. I'm always amazed by the line of cars that turns off the highway into the gravel driveway of the tree farm. It reminds me of the movie, Field of Dreams, "If you build it, they will come." The 'it' being a pumpkin patch, craft store, beautiful potted mums, petting zoo, corn cannon, corn maze, a playground, etc.... in other words, a taste of country.

I grew up in a small town with 'country' all around me. I love the simple life that comes with small town, rural Iowa. And nowadays I'm paying 7 dollars admission for it. Kind of ironic, but we love it.

Thanks for reading!

Amanda

A Very Happy Florida Birthday!!!

I had my big 3-0 birthday on Sunday! My husband a few months back asked what I wanted and I said I wanted to see my sister Magdalena and her husband Justin. So we booked our flights and headed down to Fort Myers, Florida. It was honestly THE BEST birthday ever!!! We did all my favorite things! We took the boat out to Sanibel Island, collected shells, swam, ate great food, played fun games, went to their awesome church, shopped and just enjoyed each others company. My sister and brother in law are the best hostesses! I can't wait for them to come to Iowa sometime soon so that I can spoil them like they did for us!

Ahhh...back to work!
Rachel Pierce

rpierce@myabc5.com

Latino Heritage Festival

The 9th annual Latino Heritage Festival was this weekend. Something new they added this year "Dancing with the Celebrities". I was one of eight competitors to take the stage. We each got paired up with a local professional dancer, they picked the style of dance and song and we had a six hour crash course to learn our dance. I danced the cha cha and had a total blast. This was way outside of my comfort zone and to tell you the truth I was super nervous to dance in front of anyone but my immediate family and dance partner, Manuel Cabrejos. My daughter Lydia watched me practice in her playroom all week and would dance right there with me, lets just say at a year and a half, she has better rhythm.

Manuel was so patient and such a great teacher. Outside of being a full time college student at Iowa State he's also a professional salsa dancer. If you ever need to take any sort of dance lesson I highly recommend him. You can find him at Salsa Des Moines.

So for the actual competition, we all danced one by one and then after the scores were tallied half of us were cut...including me. Ah, it was fun while it lasted. Congrats to the winner Fabiola Pastorino!

As my husband told me, for six hours of learning something I've never done before I did the best I could. I'm kind of sad its all over...hmmm maybe salsa lessons are in my future!

I've talked about this so much the last few weeks I'm sure the newsroom is sick of hearing about it, but I think I have one of the celebrities for next year signed up...my co-anchor Amanda Krenz is ready to put her dancing shoes on! Watch out!

Thanks for reading!

Rachel Pierce

rpierce@myabc5.com

Quite the BASH!

My brother, Wes, got married this weekend and it will forever be remembered as one of the most fun, exhausting weekends of my life. He married his beautiful wife, Sarah, in an outdoor ceremony (the same location my husband and I were married eight years ago).

Here's a photo of my family with the bride and groom, my parents, and sister, Shannon.The boys looked quite handsome in their vests, ties, and Chuck Taylor sneakers.Here's the venue where we had the reception. It was like a fairy tale. A lot of work to decorate and a lot of fun to party in!My mom had the idea to light sky lanterns. It was magical. We filled the night sky with love wishes for Wes and Sarah. It was an amazing moment. I might be gushing about it, I can't help it. It was really beautiful. Congratulations Wes and Sarah!

Zoo!

I'm embarrassed to say this, but today was my first time to the Blank Park Zoo! I kept meaning to go but I always ended up taking my daughter somewhere else. I'm totally regretting it now because she just ate it up! With the perfect weather today and the small crowds it was just a blast for our family. Plus she's just sixteen months old so even the little ducks were impressive t0 her. The zoo is the perfect size to stop in look around and go, everything is so close together. I see more visits in the near future and for sure a membership next year.

Rachel Pierce

rpierce@myabc5.com

Summer

(My 16 month old little girl just loves picking and eating tomatoes out of our garden.)

(Variety the Children's Charity event, Polo on the Green)

Where has the summer gone...okay maybe its not over just yet. Lydia is at such a fun age where she enjoys playgrounds, pools, other kids (sometimes), bubbles, animals and anything outdoors.


We had a blast hosting family and friends in town almost every weekend this summer. We love showing off what the metro has to offer. And my husband and I also got some time to ourselves here and there, like attending the Variety the Children's Charity event, Polo on the Green.


(Ran to the playground for some fun this morning)

Rachel Pierce

rpierce@myabc5.com