Candy & Parades

What can we say?  We love America.  But as proud as we are to be Americans, Elko is even more proud of it's Basque heritage, so they hold their Basque Festival on the 4th of July weekend every year.  Hence we didn't technically have an Independence Day Parade to go to on Saturday- it was the Basque Festival parade, complete with strong men competition floats, very nice dancing, and advertising.

Parades in Elko are all about the candy.  The floats are generous, the children are few, (or at least compared to Utah parades) and we were positioned just right to get literally armfuls of candy thrown our way.  Eli was hesitant, like he was politely disbelieving that he could just go TAKE THE CANDY, but Porter had no restraint.  He was out to collect as much as possible.

There was a children's parade the morning of the 4th of July, and Eli was so excited that he would be in an actual parade.  When it turned out to be a small affair on a sidewalk thru the park with maybe a dozen grandparents looking on he was in no way discouraged.  He waved his flag and smiled with gusto, constantly berating me for not bringing candy to throw at the "crowd".

The parade ended with an Old Fashioned Fourth party, complete with a Watermelon Eating Contest, a Sack Race, Bean Bag Toss, and a Pie Walk.  Since there were only about thirty kids there Eli got to compete in and "win" everything.  Porter was mostly interested in stuffing his face with watermelon.

Eli actually did win the pie walk on his first try, and you have never seen such a proud hunter-gatherer.  He told everyone he met about how "the other kids didn't win.  I WON the apple pie", and he insisted that we bring it to our friend's house in the evening to share while we watched the fireworks from their deck.
Altogether, an awesome holiday.