The Non-Parade

Today I decided to be brave and take both kids into Rochester on my own to go to the Rochesterfest parade. I had a game plan, and felt very well prepared to handle the outing. I had the stroller, blanket, and lawn chair in the truck, the diaper bag and cooler packed so as soon as Libby woke up from her nap we were ready to go. After a quick stop at Subway (yep, even little ol' Dodge Center has a Subway now) we were on our way to downtown Rochester. The parade was scheduled to start at 6:15, so I felt pretty good about pulling into the parking ramp at 5:30. We had plenty of time to find a spot to sit and eat our supper. We were enjoying our sub and listening to some pre-parade music when all of a sudden a voice came on the loud speaker and announced that the parade was cancelled due to a potential weather threat. I was pretty disappointed; that meant that we had driven a half hour just to have a picnic on the curb. Martin was also pretty disappointed, but took the news rather well. I explained to him that it was going to rain and so they weren't going to have the parade. His response made me smile. He said, "God can make the rain go away!" :)

So I packed up the kids and all our gear and we headed back to the parking garage. I was pretty exited that we got right on the elevator without having to wait. I got the kids buckled in, the gear in the back of the truck and started to leave. ONE HOUR LATER we finally got out of the parking ramp. It was a very frustrating hour, but my kids were amazing. They didn't cry or whine or fuss at all. I was so proud of them. They earned themselves some ice cream at McDonald's on the way home.

Once we got home it did storm for a while, but we didn't get hit as hard as some of the other areas around us. In fact, the sun came out for a while and gave us a beautiful rainbow.