Good Ol' Days 2011

I think Good Ol' Days was the best it's been in quite a few years.  A whole weekend full of friends, fun, family, mud, games, and a bearable & pleasant amount of sun.


After taking a year off last year we did our family float again. We didn't start actually assembling it until  the night before the parade, but Gwen & Mom had everything organized and the supplies ready to go, so we put it together pretty quickly.

The main element is dozens of children. They are good at showing up and being excited on Saturday morning, but not real great with the helping with the work part.  So, designs with not a lot of assembly work pretty well.

Gwen brought popcorn balls for the work crew. It may have been the most exciting part.

We have all sorts of tiny helpers. They do things like redesign signs by jumping on them when the paint is wet.

We still got done in time to head down to the park for some music and the fireworks.

Azia-Rain comfortable for the firework show.

The next morning a big group of us got up bright and early for the Buffalo Run.

Racers ready to start

Israel was being lazy & only ran the mile, but he did win it for his age group. Jenna also did awesome & won it for the girls.

Mom ended up with the little girls running group. She got all six of them across the finish line. Jenna came in way ahead of the rest of them, but a but behind her Ahni, Lettie, Azia, Maysa & Paisley made it in too!

Relaxing after their race. Not sure where Paisley ran off to!

I was pretty proud of Zoran. He wanted to run the longer race & I wasn't going to let him since I had the ambulance at the run and couldn't do it with him, but Gwen offered to run with him. He did the whole thing and he did awesome.

Zoran coming across the finish. . . his support system (Gwen & Deva) following him in.

Zoran & his first place ribbon.

We went from the race to get every one ready for the parade.

The theme for our float this year was "Our fathers served yesterday so we can serve tomorrow." We had big photos of all the fathers/ grandfathers who are veterans in the family (LaMar Umphrey, Nathan Pierce, Roy Couture, Michael L Umphrey, N. Eldon Umphrey, Devlin LaFrombois) and the kids were wearing their uniforms. The kids not wearing military uniforms had uniforms of all other different occupations that served the community.

Lex checking out the other floats

Zoran in his dad's uniform

Zoran

brothers wearing Dad's uniforms

Dev hard at work. Smokey found a friend to ride with him in the parade this year. 

 

 

Daij & Israel wearing their dads' uniforms

the parade coming up mainstreet

Daij & KaNana

Azia-Rain throwing a water balloon at me when I tried to take their photo. She hit me right in the chest!

Firetrucks cooling down the parade crowd

 After the parade everyone headed down to the park for all the games.

Jenna coaching Lettie before her egg race

The 5 & under sack racers: Lettie, Brooklyn & Iyezk. I think Brook was looking for treasure in the bottom of hers.

Lex is not interested in games. This is what he did when I tried to convince him to participate.

Zoran & Bryce in the middle of the egg race

Boys ready to race: Bryce, Kellen & Zoran

In addition to all the kids' games, they also added tug-o-war to the festivities this year. It was a big hit.

Israel's team won the middle school/ high school division

Chris, Dev, Justin & Robbie: look at the determination!

Eldon & Michael's team lost to them in the first match.

but the came back to win 2 out of 3 and were the overall champs for the men's category

Michael & Dev

Lex wasn't much interested in tug-o-war either. I spent most of the afternoon looking for him because he'd run away as soon as I wasn't holding on to him. He liked the big bouncy toys better than everything else going on. Eventually, he'd come back to Dev's work trailer. Usually before I found him. He did like hanging out in the fish pool after they'd taken out all the fish. Maybe I just need to leave him in there all afternoon next year so I can keep track of him.

Deva working while everyone else was playing in the mud. She had a booth doing feathery- hair-extension- things. "Fairy Hair" is probably a better name!

Zoran couldn't resist getting in on the mud action.

Later that evening they had music at the amphitheater again.

Iyezk & Azia

We didn't stay too long since Lex cut open his toe running around on the basketball courts with the skateboarders.

I think Iyezk & Azia liked rolling down the  hill as much as sitting on it listening to the music.

Sunday morning I took the kids out to the Fly In. Free breakfast and airplane rides. Not a bad deal.

Out at the airport

Lex was pretty annoyed that he wasn't old enough to get a plane ride. He spent most of the morning amusing himself with his collection of supermen.

Azia wouldn't ride in one of the planes this year. (She did it last year.) She said it was too scary and she was sure they were all going to die. I guess a small plane would be even more frightening than a rollercoaster. She did however enjoy the breakfast, hanging out with her friend Sajada, and winning a whole collection of huckleberry products in the drawing.

Israel was definitely up for a flight.

Israel flying away

Lex did get to play in the water. The fire truck emptied its tank so even though it wasn't flying, it was still pretty cool.

All the kids playing in the water.

Overall it was a busy but fun weekend. I was really impressed with all the different activities the community put together. It's events like this that make living in a small town pretty great.