Small town Homecoming parade

Today we took my husband's absentee ballot request to the courthouse so he can vote in this year's election (very important for everyone to do), then went to our local high school's homecoming parade.

When I was in high school, in another state, we didn't have a homecoming parade, other than a procession of the king and queen and attendants around the football field at half time. So I wasn't quite sure what to expect. Little Miss Sunshine and I both had a good time, though, and the parade was actually a pretty good one. Such a small town thing: the kids were let out of school early (the parade was at 1:00), the elementary kids were bussed over, and they sat on the edge of the sidewalk, all wearing their red shirts, waving and grabbing the candy as it was thrown. People of all ages, many wearing red shirts to show team spirit, gathered. Some brought chairs to sit in, some sat on the curb, and everyone chatted while we waited for the parade to reach us. There were fire engines, the marching band, the cheerleaders, the classic cars, the horse groups, the homecoming king and queen candidates, the kids from the local gymnastics and dance studios, and each of the sports teams from the high school and middle school had a float, as did some of the clubs. LMS stood and waved and looked really cute, which ensured that lots of candy was thrown in her direction. She figured out pretty quick which groups were throwing candy, and as they approached us she would ask me 'throw yanny?' (yanny=candy). She thought it was pretty nifty for people to be throwing candy at her. After the parade was over, I asked her if she had fun, and she said 'throw yanny. throw yanny'. It really made an impression on her.

Last night I succumbed to my OCD and stayed up way later than I should have to finish one of my quilts. So tonight I am going to bed at 10, and I think in the future I will try to be in bed by 10:30 every night. I've been staying up too late lately, and I'm starting to feel the effects of not enough sleep. It's just so much easier to stay up rather than go to bed by myself. It's mostly something I do subconsciously, not on purpose, but it happens more frequently than it should.