Hometown Parade

Matt, Jay, and I hit the road Thursday afternoon. Matt needed to do a bit of business on this road trip so we stopped in a town on the way to Grandma's house. While Matt worked, Jay and I played in the town's local park. That worked perfectly! Then we arrived at Grandma's house in time to hit the hay.

Friday we just enjoyed the beautiful day (the weather was PERFECT) around Grandma's house. Jay always asked to go outside when we were inside for any length of time. (He asks by pointing and making an insistent "uh uh uh" sound.) It was so fun to watch him explore the farm. He especially liked watching the kitties. They are a bit on the wild side so they didn't allow us to pet them, but Jay sure found them fascinating. He would squat down low and jabber jabber jabber at them. So funny!

Saturday morning after Jay's nap we ventured in to town for the annual parade. I have the best memories from attending our small town parades so it is fun to share that experience with Jay now, too.

Here are some of the kids awaiting the best part of the parade...to be thrown some candy. They were using their cowboy hats as their candy baskets.
And here they are quickly running and picking up the candy that had just been thrown to them.

Here is the local rodeo association folks riding in the parade on their horses.

My favorite part of the parades when I was a little girl were the floats. Here are the floats that were part of the parade this year:

Ritzville (I know two out the three girls who were chosen to represent my home town this year). The theme of their float is Purple Dream.

Deer Park came with their Drive-In themed float.

Odessa came with their Under the Sea themed float.

And Davenport had a Flintstone themed float this year.

It is so fun to watch the kids' excitement. Here is Jay's second cousin, Zachary, on his John Deere tractor that he rode in the Kiddie Parade that just preceded the main parade.

This was Jay's most favorite parade entry - an old-time tractor. He pointed and lit up and made his motor sound when this went by us.

And here he is watching that tractor like a hawk (while I fed him his lunch).

The parade ended with the second graders getting to ride on a fire truck. This is an annual tradition that has gone on for as long as I can remember.

After the parade we ventured up to the town's local park where they have a BBQ sandwich lunch. Jay enjoyed playing on the park's kid play structures and slides while Matt and I visited with friends.

We had planned to attend the rodeo at the fairgrounds Saturday night but a big dust storm rolled through town about that time. It would have been kinda miserable to sit in the bleachers in the wind and dust so we decided to skip it this year.

I'll end this post with some pictures we took of Jay over the weekend around Grandma's house.

He enjoyed his ice cream treat - can you tell?

He loved walking up and down the wheelchair ramp.

Here he is exploring Grandma's yard/gardens.

He got especially excited to watch and listen to Grandma's cuckoo clock when it chimed at every hour. He would rush to whoever was closest to him and ask to be lifted up to watch it closely as it sang it's little song. (Here he is in Grandma's arms.)