Parade

We took Sylvie to the St. Patrick's Day Parade in John's hometown today. Can you see Sylvie in the picture above waving her Irish flag? I use the term "waving" loosely, as she was more interested in poking our eyes and faces with it and bopping the head of anyone that came within reach of her. Thank goodness people love a parade and didn't seem to mind too much!

Sylvie was a little apprehensive when we first got there, mainly just from the noise and commotion of the whole thing. But about 5 seconds later she was over it, and totally captivated. She spent just about the entire time on John's shoulders, loving every float, bagpiper, dancer, you-name-it that went by.

Here are some of my favorite pics from the parade:







And last but not least, bringing up the rear:

It was quite an ending to an awesome couple of hours, and none of us were ready to go home. We drove to a local diner and grabbed a bite to eat and then decided to hit a nearby park, Jockey Hollow. It's an historical park, home to George Washington's troops during the winter of 1879-1880. The park is big and beautiful and there are reproduction soldier huts on top of a great big hill, you can see them here in the background of this pic:

We decided to make our way up to get a closer view, and on the way made friends with a little boy named Ethan. He was checking out Sylvie's killer wheels and was thrilled when I told him he could take a ride. They became fast friends.

Here we are playing peek a boo through the hut window:

Sylvie could have played this game all afternoon I think. That and the "where's the cow, Mommy?" game. Apparently Sylvie thought that the huts were home to horses and cows (in all fairness to her there was an awful lot of straw and hay inside of them) and she kept asking us where the horses and cows were. Non stop.

We then took a little hike through the woods, but quickly made our way back to the big hill. Sylvie was a little too excited for the hike, which was really bumpy, with lots of big rocks and sticks. She just kept falling and of course didn't want to be held! So back we went to the big hill, where John showed her a new game.

Pushing her bicycle down the hill, while running after it! She had a total blast, while I was a ball of nerves waiting to see her tumble head over heels down the whole hill. I tried hard not to be a total buzz kill but I was a nervous wreck, and not too fond of this game. Thank goodness for care free Daddies.