I'm a sucker for a parade!

I forgot to blog about this a while ago but we went out to the Starlight parade and had so much fun! We are in the tail end of the Rose Festival that is held here in Portland with lots of fun activities and parades going on for a couple of weeks. The starlight parade is a parade held at night and all the floats and people are all decked out in lights and glowing things. I really wanted to go last year but we had just moved here and we didn't make it there.

I don't know why but I am a sucker for a parade. I know they are kinda lame and not very exciting but I love them! I love them so much that I braved downtown Portland by myself with Maddy and Josey to go see it. I had wanted to take them to it but Dustin wasn't feelin' it so I left him home with Lilly and the older girls and I jumped in the car sort of spur of the moment and drove into the city. I will admit I was a little nervous about trying to find parking and making it over to the parade but it all worked out great. We even got a fairly good spot and the girls were VERY excited. Funny story though! So we waited there about an hour for the parade to start. FINALLY it was about 9:00 and the parade was going to reach us any minute and guess who has to go to the bathroom? JOSEY! So we had to run around and try to find a bathroom. We finally found a McDonalds and literally the line for the women's restroom was almost out the front door. So we had to wait at least 20 minutes to get her into a restroom. So we missed the beginning of the parade but I can't say I am surprised. Things always go like that don't they?I just wanted to highlight some of our favorite floats and groups. Here you see that man walking the recycling bin. This wasn't a random man walking a recycling bin for people to throw things away in. No this was a whole choreographed recycling group.......only in Portland.We saw tons and tons of high school marching bands. These were my particularly favorite uniforms of the bunch. What is UP with those hats?These guys were really fun to watch. Luckily the parade got held up right here while they were in front of us so we got to watch them for a while. That big inflatable guy would suddenly drop down to normal height and then magically pump up again. It was very cool!And of course one of our favorite places to go....the Oregon Zoo. And this one is for the Moyes clan. The John Deere float. What can I say?


About half-way through Josey had conked out on me. It was 10:00 and WAY past her bedtime! So I ended up having to carry her and the chairs back to the parking garage at 11:00 but Maddy was a big help carrying the bag of snacks around her neck and the blanket in her arms. That part wasn't the funnest but I am really glad that we went. Hopefully we can make it a yearly tradition. Maddy is hoping that we can make it to the Grand Floral Parade on Saturday. I think a lot more people attend that one so I am not sure I will be able to talk Dustin into that one but we will see! I of course want to be there!