Thursday, June 12, 2008

Parades!





The past two weeks were the Portland Rose Festival. We went to the Junior Parade, and Rebekah, Michael and Rachel went to the Rose Parade with me. They were both a lot of fun. Michael rides his unicycle in the junior parade each year with the unicycling club from our school district--there are about 100 kids who ride together. It's a bit dangerous! They are riding so close together and with the starting and stopping it gets pretty messy, but they always have a great time.
The Rose Parade is fun for us because Grandma Sandy is in the One More Time Around Again Marching Band. I am not sure what you would call it, maybe drill team? She dances before the band comes by. They are the largest band in the country with more than 500 members, all band alumni of varying ages. In the video clip, Grandma is in the center with blonde hair. The kids were yelling "Grandma, Grandma!" but there were a lot of Grandma's there, so it took her a while to notice us! Rachel spent the whole parade waiting for flowers to fall off of the floats, and she finally got a rose right at the end. We had a great spot on the parade route, just a block from the beginning, so there were a lot of news people around us filming. We had a good time, and Rachel had WAY too much sugar!

Graduations

We have had lots of events in the last two weeks with school coming to a close. Yesterday Michael had graduation, and today Josh had a balloon crossing ceremony, where they have balloon arches that go across the road from the junior high to the high school and everyone walks beneath the arches to the high school stadium. It is amazing that Josh is old enough to be in high school now! My freshman days are all too clear in my head still, and it's a little bit scary for me to have a son growing up so fast!