Time for the P-Rade!

When we were kids, my mom would always take us downtown for the St. Patrick’s Day parade.  It’s HUGE.  I remember once getting to ride in a wagon pulled by Burmese mountain dogs.  It used to be a big Denver thing, but now, now it’s super huge.  Biggest on this side of the Mississippi.  And because we had record high temps and gorgeous sunshine this year, I think they said there were 25,000 people walking in the parade, and somewhere in the 300,000 range for attendance.  It was insanely chaotic.  This was where we were- and we were at the end, in the less “populated” section. 

I, admittedly, hadn’t figured that it would be this crazy.  It has, afterall, only been about 20+ years since we went last.  I guess things change.  People were camped out for 5 or more hours for the prime seating areas.  We got there about 20 minutes before it started.  Yikes.

But, all was well, and after we got the double stroller (cripes) stuck behind the group of people, we actually got decent seats.  Piper hang out with Dad, and Addy and I took a spot on the ground down front.        

We knew the parade was finally starting (it takes a long time for it to get to the tail end of the route when it’s a few miles long…) when the Marine’s came by.  Daddy made sure that the girls saw them, ‘cause you sure can’t miss the Marines!

They had folks giving out green beads and green rubber ducks, along with candy (obviously.)  Problem is that they aren’t allowed to throw candy any more (good grief- really???), so it had to be handed to you.  And guess who got all the goods?

I ended up giving stuff to the girl next to us because her mom was getting irritated that they weren’t paying attention to her daughter.  Addy is fairly adept at catching the eyes of people and coercing them to giving her stuff.  This could be potentially problematic as she gets older, but in the meantime, I’ll enjoy the candy she, ahem, lets me have…

After all the fun (and Piper oohed and awed over the horses, tons and tons of dogs, big trucks…), we went inside to the train station to go potty.  The big seats were perfect grounds for Addy to stretch her legs after no being allowed any free roaming for the morning.

And I also, miraculously, got a few sweet pictures of the girls together.

They were fading fast at this point, so we were off to find something to eat for lunch.

We were going to grab something quick down there and then head back to the car (we parked a couple miles away), but since the crowds were overwhelmingly large (and growing by the minute, it seemed, with people who used the St. Patty’s holiday to act like idiots…), we just headed back to the car.

And then I had an epiphany.  It was a holiday, right?  And on holidays, you get to treat yourself.  So, we stopped at the little ice cream stand and had ourselves a yummy lunch.  Once Piper learned what we were doing, her drowsiness subsided.  It did take the promise of sugar, however, to get her to open her eyeballs more than this:

Addy needed no help pushing past the sleepiness.  As if that was a surprise.

Piper enjoyed her very own cone.  And Addy?  Addy thought this was the best thing for lunch ever.