Fireworks on Friday

You know it's a good weekend when you go to bed Thursday night feeling pretty proud that you are totally caught up on the blog ... and by Sunday evening, you are at least three posts behind!

Another weekend observation - it's hard to be named Declan this time of year. Or I suppose it's hard to be nicknamed "Dec" this time of year. But the rest of us reeeeally enjoy singing "deck the halls" with an emphasis on the "deck" to watch his head pop up. Every.dang.time!

We kicked off the holiday season on Friday night by heading to downtown S-town for the 2nd annual Holiday Fest. I had a work meeting all the way across town, so Mike ordered a pizza, I scooped up the kids, and we somehow managed to not only get to the parade route on time. We were early. I just need to document that - because it doesn't happen often. We even remembered bags for the kids to collect their candy. As it was significantly colder than last year, I was glad to not give up my hat again.

We grabbed a spot near the beginning of the route again. It seems less crowded there (and you know how much Vs don't like people). We had several friends downtown - and unfortunately we weren't able to hook up with all of them. However, B&C and their gang made it over to our parade spot and the six kids had so much fun watching together. Several groups seemed to learn from last year and there were significantly fewer candy canes being thrown. My mint-hating Fiona was a fan. My broken-candy-cane-hating Quinn was a fan. My I-just-like-candy Declan was indifferent.

They got so much candy again this year. Combined with the huge bucket of Halloween candy that we still haven't finished, I can't even with all the candy. However, I feel confident that all the Milky Ways are gone ...

We all followed the end of the parade to the center of town and watched as Santa (Renaissance Santa, according to Brad and Mike) counted down to light the tree. We had all the short people problems - so I was holding Bugs up, Mike had Dec, and Quinn had smiled at Uncle Brad and he had her (those two ... peas in a pod!). As soon as the tree lit, the fireworks started!!! Apparently the two things learned from last year were 1) candy canes break and 2) waiting until 8pm to start fireworks is too late. However, NOBODY knew they were going to start.

You couldn't really see the fireworks from where we were standing and it was very suddenly mass chaos as people races to better vantage points. Bugs and I made our way toward the back parking lot. As we were running, I saw Jack and no tall Ps. When I asked him if he knew where his parents were and he said "no," Bugs and I added a member to our group. We snagged a good spot (thanks to a lot of tall people who saw that I had short people and moved us to the front) and we watched quite a delightful show (while I texted B&C to tell them I had Jack!).

Fiona still didn't love the loud sounds that the fireworks made - but she admitted it was better than last year. She also said that having Jack with her helped. The three of us agreed that the sizzling ones were our favorite. Once the finale was over, we worked our way back through the crowd to find our group. Surprisingly, it didn't take us long. But we laughed that we had mostly watched them separately (Brad and Quinn had found Cheryl, Hannah, and Cooper part way through). I love doing life with the Ps - it didn't matter whose kid it is. Ever. [Once Mike convinced Dec that the fireworks weren't going to land on him, D loved them. According to Brad, Quinn loved every single second of it. To the point where a stranger told him that he had to check out Q's awestruck face.]

The kids were cold and the lines for every holiday station were long. So we decided to do hot cocoa at our house instead of downtown. Other than the chaos, we were all big fans of the fireworks happening right away. Hopefully that change sticks. Next year, we'll revise our tree lighting positioning.

The kids had cocoa and marshmallows, warmed up, and started an epic Nerf gun battle downstairs. We played and visited for an hour or so and then called it a night. It seems like last year's December habits may be starting up again ... it's so hard to have early (or on-time) bedtimes when there is holiday fun to be had.

PS: the kids were in bed at 7:30 tonight and did not utter a syllable of complaint about it.