For Independence Day I had the brilliant idea to have a parade after reminiscing about the parades I participated in as a child. I came to the conclusion that the reward of having 14 grandchildren meant I had enough people to have our very own parade. Sooo I called the kids and told them to meet at our house that morning with the kids dressed to indicate the date and something to ride on push or pull. I provided red, white and blue decorations and "pop-its" for their use. We decorated bikes, stroller, wagon and scooters with flags, pinwheels, crepe paper and sparkley stuff. Our neighbor Oleeta who has lived in this neighborhood since it's beginnings asked what we were doing? When we told her it was a parade she said "It's about time there was a parade here on Brookview Dr. We used to parade many years ago." We also noticed a few kids down the street riding their bikes and invited them to join us. They did and our journey began. The kids ranged in ages from 14 down to months old. We crossed the street carefully to be on the downhill side and lined up to show off for Oleeta and her friend. He honked his horn and we started off shouting "Hooray for the red, white and blue." As we paraded around the block waving and shouting our motto and popping the pop-its I noticed something sad. Most of the people who acknowledged us were older people whose sense of patriotism is stronger. But many still smiled and waved, who wouldn't when you saw those adorable children. One older gentleman stopped and asked us "what was going on?" Of course we reported with joy the reason for our celebration and the kids again celebrated with pop-its. We had a grand time made new neighbor friends and started our country's celebration in style. I think we will make it an anual event.
