2009 Lakeland Christmas Parade

One of our yearly traditions is attending the Lakeland Christmas Parade, this year we wanted to be sure to get to go as a family so Alex had pre arranged to take December 3rd as a vacation day. My parents took all the chairs down and ropes us off a nice big corner at 7:00 am the morning of the parade. We got there about 4:30 pm and were fully prepared for our "block party" with TONS of food on hand!

Ethan had just woken up from his nap before we headed out the door and I knew the little man would be hungry so we set out his picnic blanket and he had his lunchable...but then he decided it would taste better if eaten on top of Aunt Jenny's truck while he people watched!

In all I think we had about 30 people in our group. We always go with my immediate family and then each of us has friends that join us! This year of course My Mom, Dad, Jenny, Ashley (I'm sorry Ash...you aren't in any of the pics!), and Kaley and we as a family invited our good friends Sean and Valerie as well as Steve, Katie, and Ethan Rippy.

Parade watching at it's best! We had good seats right on the curb and the kids LOVED it. Emma and Ethan were so excited and danced to all the marching bands, and would yell and scream if they saw a float coming our way that they were particularly excited about.

Here are a few of our "favorites". From Left to Right clockwise: Cinderella in a snowglobe (Ems most favorite), the Monster Bus (I gotta give this one props, it was pretty cool!), A Rainbow Float, The Starwars Brigade (by far Alex's fav!), Ronald McDonald, Motorcycles, and the Lakeland Fire Dept. The last 3 being Ethan's favorites, and I must say it's a pretty good toss up between "Donalddddddd" and the "Motocyclezzzzzz"!