Waiting for the parade to start with pumpkin cinnamon rolls, hot chocolate, and Uno!
Porter is so funny, he spent quite a bit of time up-side-down on the railing.
Then the parade got started and here came the clowns! They were so fun and came over by the kids and threw confetti on them and gave them stickers and cheered. Their energy was catching!
Then came the marching bands. Kyler loved watching them. But he was disappointed not to see any baritone horns. :)
Then came the big balloons. Notice the people who have balconies over the street watching from their apartments. The kids thought that was pretty lucky! Crowds were even gathered up on the rooftops.
Then came Avril Lavigne on the famous turkey that is in the parade every year. She is in the white coat.
And Sesame Street. I really was excited about that because there was Gordon and Bob, and Luis and Maria! I didn't know they were still around, and still on Sesame no less. I was telling my kids how that used to be the only kid-show on TV when I was younger.
Porter with confetti in his mouth from a clown throwing it at him.
He spent a good majority of his time gathering the shredded paper off the street to throw back at them!
Brenner loved seeing Buzz Lightyear.
Cee-Lo Green. He sings the song at the end of Kung-Fu Panda, have you seen the music video? And he was on The Voice, I watched that a time or two last season. Otherwise I would have had no idea who he was.
This was so funny. A filler for in case the parade sped up... haha. A mermaid on a lobster pulled by a golf cart. The crowd was yelling out giving her a bad time asking who she was supposed to be. Poor girl!
Miss Mia liked the Mickey Mouse balloon. She napped for the first hour and then woke up and loved seeing everything going on. This is her "Oh!" face.
This was Lexi's favorite star of the day: Chyna from ANT Farm on Disney Channel. That girl does have an amazing voice.
A few more of the many balloons floating by. So fun to see them in real life! I still sometimes can't believe that we live in New York City.
Neil Diamond with "Coming to America" playing. He was videoing the crowd. (???)
The kids liked this Ronald McDonald Shoe-Car.
And they thought it looked like he was crying because he had a popped foot.
The boys were fans of this big guy...
It looked like Spider Man was really creeping along...
And Mary J. Blige. Too bad we were too far away from the Center of the parade where Matt Lauer and crew were, where everyone stopped and did their thing. I heard she gave a great performance.
Lexi liked the 1,600 cheerleaders.
Not so much the southern belles. (I asked her if she wanted to wear a dress like theirs and got this face.)
Here is the Fresh Beat Band and Dora from Nickelodeon. Gosh, do we have the TV on too much or what? The fact that I actually know who these people are tells me that yes the TV is on too much at our house!
Once again, Porter up-side-down.
Kermit-thee-Frog here.
And after 2 hours, signalling the end of the parade, here comes Santa Claus!
What was Brenner doing while Santa's float was coming down the street?
Santa welcoming in the Christmas season.
After the parade was over the kids ran into the street to throw more shredded paper at each other. That was worth the early morning wake-up call right there!
A walk back across Central Park with the Chenn family.
A few more blocks to the subway. I love Park Street.
After a 10 minute subway ride back home, Dave went and got the car at the parking garage and we took off for Thanksgiving dinner at my cousin's house in New Jersey, pies and rolls in tow. It didn't even cross our minds that all 8 million people in NYC had the same plan. We were stuck in a traffic jam inching along for over an hour trying to get out of the city. But the dinner was well worth the wait as was the company; two of my cousins, Jon and Casey, and their cute wives and families.
I got a few pictures of Malia with her 2nd cousins at the kid table. She felt so big sitting there in her own chair.
The kids had a great time playing outside in the yard and when 7 of them were on the trampoline together laughing I went outside to take a picture, carrying Malia, and I fumbled and dropped the camera down the concrete stairs. It shattered into pieces. Oh, I was heartsick. I still am heartsick about it. No more picture taking, except with my phone. Ugggh!
I am so thankful for all of my many blessings. At Thanksgiving it is such a great time to focus on what we have been given. For FHE a couple weeks ago the kids and I made Thankful Turkeys instead of our usual Thankful Tree. It was fun, although I missed adding to our Thankful Tree throughout the month of November.
I love how Porter always thinks of so many blessings. His turkey was overflowing. I couldn't get Kyler to make one this year, he was too busy working on his own projects. But Lexi did a nice turkey and Brenner told what he was thankful for. It was his first year to understand what we were doing. So sweet. There is such a nice spirit present when we count our blessings!
