::memorial day::

We had a fun Memorial Day. In the morning we went to little parade in our friends' smallish town. The parade went right past their street which was really fun. There was a really festive feel all around.
But wait, I'm getting ahead of myself. Really we started the day with a "blue raspberry" icee thing for Max, on the way to the parade. If we'd had any idea the amounts of sugar he was going to enjoy later, we never would've done it. But what's done is done. And his tongue was so grossly blue.


The kids couldn't wait for the parade to actually start. You can see here that they're prepared in case of a candy onslaught--halloween pumpkins and all.

The adults were excited too--though I know Kris's face isn't giving too much away.

Then here came this guy. The guy who somewhere along the way had pilfered a shopping cart from someplace and was using it to sell his piles and mounds of cotton candy.

Then a kind-hearted grandfather hooked the kids up with some. Blue of course. Max went for it. He was so disgusting after a little while. Icky, sticky, and blue.


The best part was when some politician came by shaking everybody's hands. He shook Max's and Henry's both. I imagined he was very very sorry for quite a while.

There were lots of fire engines, a couple of bands, a bagpipe troupe and a couple of floats.
This one's for my mom--an old guy behind a huge Breyer horse. I think he was from a local stable.

Then of course there were lots of Shriners doing lots of different stuff. We always love the little cars.

There were a few real veterans in the parade and we were glad to see them.
I thought this guy was the highlight though--crazy Uncle Sam who somehow was himself and a puppet of himself at the same time.

He was pretty awesome.

Then the parade abruptly ended and there was a big line of normal people in their cars, who had probably been waiting for an hour to get through.

We went home and spent the rest of the day getting stuff done. Except I took a two hour nap. I wish I could do that every day.
I wish every day was a monday off, really.

::grand prize::

I can't believe I almost left the best parade outfit out! This guy is serious about the fourth of July, let me tell you.

Really he looks to me like an upgrade on Rex Kwon Do from Napoleon Dynamite.
I think he's probably put in his two seasons fighting in the Octagon.

::the 4th part 1::

I'm a little behind, but that's ok, right?

The fourth of july was one of the first days all summer that's been truly sunny and quite hot actually. We got up and headed over to the other side of the bay for the Bristol parade. Supposedly this parade has been happening since 1785 (wow). So it's quite the institution. We went last year and had a really good time, so we didn't want to miss out this year.
We had to drive separately since Kris was on call (boo). But luckily since Kris's parents were here we all had people to keep us company.

Max is lucky to have a strong dad who can still carry him up on shoulders. It won't work for too much longer I'm afraid!
We got there after things had already started. We walked up the sidewalk as far as we could, then at some point it was just so crowded we had to just stop and stand and watch from the sidewalk. Which was great as far as the view went, but terrible as far as shade. We were in full sun. Luckily there were some whispy clouds in the sky, but not enough to make us comfortable.

Anyway.
One of the first things we saw were guys dressed up like old time baseball players. This guy was throwing a ball to people in the crowd. They looked really fun.


We saw pretty horses that I know my mom will appreciate.

These guys are gorgeous:



Every time a horse came along Max would yell, "UH OH!!" and tell me that I needed to hold my breath so I wouldn't sneeze.

Max found a little friend to talk to for a bit.



I always like to see the marching bands--especially the sharp looking groups with lots of members. They come from all over for this parade. I especially liked the uniforms on the following bands:



I'm glad it wasn't me wearing those unis marching in the sun though. Torture.

The Navy guys looked sharp. There are a lot of military in the parade since there are a lot of bases and stuff nearby. It's fun to see them marching in uniform.

We always like the Shriners in their little cars.

And Max liked seeing a scotty dog--what's a parade without at least one dog?

And the reinactors are fun to see--lots of drum and fife groups and soldiers and maidens/wenches.
I like the drums.


What we don't like? The guns and the cannons. They are SO SO loud, and so startling. So at some point Max just kept his hands over his ears constantly.

I don't blame him. I had my ears covered most of the time too. I'm just glad he's big enough to cover his own so that I can keep my hearing.

POW!!

We left before it was all over--crazy that we could stay for two hours and get there after it started and leave before it was done. It's a long long parade. We didn't have a lot of traffic getting home which was nice.
To sum it up, we had a good morning.

More to hopefully follow soon!

::a walk & a parade::

So I know that it's past halloween now, and seeing a whole bunch of posts about it is a little bit anticlimactic, but oh well. It's how I do things.

So at the end of the week on an afternoon Max's school held a halloween parade. We live relatively close to his school, a little more than a mile away. So we often walk there. We walked to the parade, and met our friends Melissa and Grant halfway there so they could enjoy the festivities too.

And since I had the camera with me I took advantage. The leaves are so pretty right now.







Here's my usual view when walking to school. Max in the stroller, covered with a snuggly blanket.

He usually rides when we walk to school. But sometimes when we're not under time constraints he walks. He's just not much of a fast walker.

And we met Melissa and Grant. It was a really nice day.

A nice day to hang out with good friends.

And there we were at the school. The kids were running around, crazy with enthusiasm and excitement.

Max was inspired by our silly halloween movie and decided to be a wizard for the remaining festivities, instead of a giraffe. I think I already said that before. Anyway, because of the movie he had the impression that wizards went around with their hoods covering their faces. Of course that isn't true, but because of the movie now he doesn't believe me. Mostly I'm afraid he's just going to run into something and hurt himself. But I'm always worried about that.



Grant was fascinated by all the kids running around. He loves to watch Max, and the additional kids were just as fun.

He's so cute.

We finally all got organized and stomped/ran/noodled around the block. Max yelled "HAPPY HALLOWEEN!" at the top of his lungs most of the way.
There were lots of fun costumes, but one of my favorites was this cute little snake.

Pretty amazing costume.

I tried to talk Max into wearing his pirate beard, or a wizard hat or something else fun. But he's not really into any of that stuff, so he was just the wizard with a robot sweatshirt. Whatever makes him happy.

We ended the fun with a few doughnut holes, or "munchkins" which is what they call them out here. Then we walked home. It was a good day.

::Happy Fourth::

I think the 4th of July is one of the funnest holidays that there is. I think this is mainly because my parents always celebrated it in really fun exciting ways, (please see my mom's post about this for more details). We would have big huge parties, go to parades and hot air balloon festivals, eat all sorts of delicious food and enjoy lots of fireworks.

This kind of celebrating leaves a lot to live up to. Sometimes the 4th just doesn't cut it, no matter how hard we try. This year though, it was great!

We were planning on heading to Bristol RI in the morning with our friends Chad and Melissa to see a famous parade that's been going on there for years and years (supposedly since 1785). But we woke up in the morning and there was a lot of rain outside. And it kept raining.
Finally the rain let up a bit. Unfortunately by that time the parade was already supposed to have started. We decided we would just go out there anyway, and see what there was to see.

We got there an hour or more after the official start time, but after we parked and walked out to the parade route we realized that the parade was going strong! And as we watched and watched we figured out that we really hadn't missed much at all.
It was a great parade. The first thing we saw and heard when we walked up was a fun marching band.
This was Max's reaction.

Yes, it's a super dorky face that he's making, but those of you that know him may be able to tell that he's really excited (but I think he knew I was taking pictures, so he had to be a little bummy.)
He was rather transfixed.

Lucky for Max dad is tall and so Max can actually see over the crowds at the edge of the sidewalk.

This parade was really great and very long. We got to see tons of stuff, and as people got tired and left we got to move closer and closer to the edge of the street, and finally ended up right up there. I was so glad that we went! It really made the holiday for me. It reminded me of the good old days at the Freedom Festival parade, and my time in high school marching band too!
Here are a few highlights:
There were a good amount of little "re-enactment" type groups that marched by. Several drum and fife bands, some platoons of soldiers. I thought this drummer looked pretty authentic.

This group wasn't very small actually.

Max didn't like it when they shot off their guns. It was really loud. And he really didn't like the canons. And WOW were those canons loud, so I can't blame him. He kept his ears covered for quite a while after the canon had gone, just in case.

Chad and Melissa's baby, on the other hand, didn't mind the explosions at all. He just slept through them and hardly flinched. In fact, he enjoyed most of the parade that way.

Just like a good and adorable newish baby should do.


There were a lot of old people in the parade. Lots of veterans from different wars, riding in cars or marching. It was neat to see them--they definitely deserve our applause.
I liked these guys with their flags. They looked so serious.

There were a lot of free masons in the parade as well, my favorite out of all of them was the "oriental band"--a whole bunch of old men playing crazy out of tune weird instruments. It sounded terrible, and they were having a blast as you can see.

The best old people I didn't get a picture of, unfortunately. There was a van from a rest home filled with old ladies with their faces painted up like clowns. They were blowing bubbles and having such a fabulous time. It was awesome.

UPDATE***
Melissa sent me a picture they took of the old ladies, so here you go! It was really funny and cute.

















There was a fabulous chinese dragon.

It was skimming along the sides of the parade route greeting all the kids. I was really hoping it would come and see Max. It did, but of course I wasn't quick enough to get the moment.

It was a fabulous dragon. Max was delighted as you can see.


Please enjoy the ugliest color guard outfits ever. There were guys in this color guard. (Actually in pretty much all the color guards.) I don't get it.

Poor girls.

Everybody enjoyed watching the parade. Here's Chad and Matt taking in the sights.


This band was awesome. They were like a crazy mardi gras group with banjos and the big string bass and crazy outfits. So entertaining to look at. They were having tons of fun.

Just look at the bari sax player down there. He's having the time of his life!


The rain kept the weather relatively cool, and the sun was behind clouds so it wasn't too bright. We didn't get rained on at all during the parade though. All in all it was perfect I think.

One of our friends has an aunt who lives in Bristol who was hosting a BBQ. She invited us to come and join in. We did and it was great.
Watermelon and hot dogs are necessary for a proper 4th.

Max got really really messy after eating several slices. He only dropped one slice all over the host's floor, and only spilled two people's drinks. Pretty good I'd say.

We were so tired by the time we got home we basically just took it easy for the rest of the evening, and didn't even go out looking for fireworks when it got dark. But that's ok. We had a great fourth of july! Thanks for joining in!