exuberant

The anticipation hanging in the air. Straining your eyes and neck as you watch for that first sign, that first sound that tells you we are about to begin. This describes the mood as we sit on the parade route on a sunny but cool, breezy bur blue-skied Fourth of July in Blanding, Utah.

Then, joy of joys, the sirens sound, the crazy truck with a band jauntily blasting a tune goes by and we are underway!

I think our friends here were concerned we would be underwhelmed by the small town version of the Fourth of July, mais non. Having spent the vast majority of my life attending just such a parade in Lewiston, Utah, I felt more at home than I think I could have anywhere else. What other parade dedicates a vehicle to the local LDS missionaries?

The kids came ready to rock, the ubiquitous plastic shopping bags in hand, fire blazing in the eyes, all energies focused on strong arming everyone out of the way to get to that last Tootsie Roll. Parker was shameless this year - he performed all sorts of dances and cheers to get more attention from the the floats and hence more candy. He has fallen under the influence of the Barlow family (my mom's side) and their yearly parade antics. Shameless but successful.


We met up with the LaRose family so they could show us the ropes. Mckayd, Londyn, Spencer, and Keldon pause the scramble for a quick cute shot. Jenna and I think that Mckayd and Spencer look more like brothers than Parker and Spencer. We are not the only ones in town that have thought it either!

I am not sure if a big brother just got that last piece of candy from Whitney's territory or if she had just spotted the fire truck

doing this to the crowd!

On a hotter day I may have trampled small children to get in on this action but not this day. The kids loved it though and came back respectably soaking wet with no loss of life under the wheels of the firetrucks.

Although we missed our Barlow family in Lewiston this year we made some great memories of our own in our new home. Just wait 'till you see what we did later that afternoon (coming soon in a future post).