Did you know I have a twin?

My college roommate, Amy, has been in town this week with her 5 kids. I haven't seen Amy for 9 years, even though we keep in frequent contact via phone, e-mail and reading each other's blogs. To actually get to hang out together this week, though, has been so therapeutic for me! To quote Ann Shirley, we are "kindred spirits." :) Almost more fun this week has been watching our kids get to know each other and become friends themselves. By the time they left tonight, they were convinced they were cousins and were calling us Aunt Misty and Aunt Amy. Actually, during college we were frequently asked if we were sisters. BYU quarterback Ty Detmer even asked if we were twins - our little claim to fame back in the 90's. In fact, we even decided to actually dress like twins for Halloween one year.Now, 17 years and several double chins later (only on my part, Amy) I guess the similarity is still there. What do you think? (My sister, Erin, is the short one - Love you Erin!).There's some fun history with the three of us. Erin and Amy met freshman year at BYU when they were roommates. I was 2 years younger and thought college life was a huge improvement from high school and stayed many-a-weekend with these two. That's actually how I met Mike (a whole other story that I'm sure most of you already know). Fast forward 2 years: Erin is married and Amy and I move in together. So it's a 3-way sisterhood. The last time we were all together was 11 years ago in Seattle when we had a girls' weekend to see U2 in concert. Good times.This is Paige with her new "cousin" Danny, Amy's 5 yr. old son. These two were an equal match in hyperactivity and creativity. Can't you just see the attitude in them both? :}These are the two Haleys. Haley Nielson is 11 and so obviously was named first. When we were considering the name for our Haley, I had to ask Amy to make sure she approved. She said, "Absolutely! The world needs a million Haley's. You just have to promise that you will spell it the one and only true way." Hence, Haley Mayfield -- not Haylee or Hailey or Hayleigh or Haelie ... I've seen some strange spellings over the years. These two Haley's became cute little friends.

Thanks for spending your vacation with us, Nielsons! Think how fun it would be to live close together, Amy. I'm just sayin' ....