4th of July

Here in Ames, the 4th of July parade and celebration also falls into the category of "Very Big Deal."  There is a pancake breakfast at city hall, a parade, and a festival-like atmosphere downtown with fireworks late.  The parade was decent, certainly better than the Memorial Day "parade" we saw that was just a line of cars with decals on them for the various civic organizations in town led by about ten Vietnam veterans on motorcycles.  Where was the bus of WWII vets I ask?  Anyway ... for Lucy, parade means candy, and once again we forgot to bring a bag to collect goodies with.  Mommy fail.  We were tucked back against the front of a restaurant in the shade, so I sent her streetside by herself.  Here she is waving to the passing parade, a sure-fire way to get pegged with a tootsie roll, right?

 Wrong.  The veterans on motorcycles (again leading the parade) did not throw any candy.  She gave me an "oh, man!"

 Jamie was sleeping when we got to the parade, but woke up when the fire truck went by, and spent the rest of the parade calmly sucking his fingers and checking the scene.

 My friend Ann met us at the parade with her kids.  Lucky for us, Carson's mommy remembered his bag and he willingly shared.  The dynamics between these two were funny.  Carson was totally content to stay on the side and hold the bag for Lucy, while she raced out in the road and beat down the older kids for candy.

We went to the parade with my baby brigade - I knew three other pregnant women when I came to Ames and we had all 4 little boys here: Franklin (Nov. 14), Hayden (Nov. 24), Jamie (Mar. 25) and Jordan (May 5).  Pictured are Hayden and Franklin, or Flankin, if you're asking Lucy. 

 

These four certainly illustrate what the baby books told me about naming trends in the US - that the "ens" are the most popular boy names out there.  And as I wanted Jamie to be named Ethan, so we would have had a clean "en" sweep.

Though we were too worn out after the parade and a trip to the pool to stay up for the fireworks (and so sound asleep I didn't even hear them) it was a Very Fun Day.