Parade Time

With both Independence Day and Pioneer Day in the month of July, there are plenty of chances to catch a parade or two. Local parades include high school and middle school bands, floats, candy, and loud sirens and horns that break young children down and leave them begging to go home. Reminding them that there is candy coming usually helps them bear the noise a little better.

What You'll Need

Camp or lawn chair(s)
Blanket(s)
Sunscreen
Umbrella(s) and/or canopy
Soft toy
Water
Bag(s) for candy
Bag for candy wrappers

How Long You'll Be There

Depending on the size of the parade, expect 2 - 3 hours of time.

Getting Ready

Depending on the size of your local parade, you'll want to arrive 30 minutes to an hour early. And by "arrive" we mean be sitting in your seat. If you want to, go out and reserve your spot along the parade route. Blankets and chairs are commonly left out, and seem to stay there overnight. We've found that for Centerville's 4th of July Parade and Farmington's Festival Days Parade we can just show up a bit before start time and get a good enough spot. The Bountiful Handcart Days parade is a different story. If you want a spot, you'll have to stake it out early or time it so that you arrive as they block off the side streets (this is our strategy when we go to this parade).

Watching the Parade

Each item on our What You'll Need list has its own use. You can probably figure out what to do with most of the items, so we'll jump to the soft toy. If you have small children, the toy will be used as a distraction in the minutes or hours prior to the start of the parade. The softer the toy, the less likely fellow parade-goers will be injured when children, or dads, start throwing it around.

In addition to providing shade, a good umbrella can come in handy when baseball teams roll by with their squirt guns.

My Favorite Part

4-year old: "I only like parts where there's candy."
6-year old: "I like the Jazz Bear and the Bee."
Mom: "I like the community feeling, and I love it when veterans go by."
Dad: "I like seeing the floats and the entries that highlight aspects of the community, such as middle and high schools, city councils, and others that have served our communities."

Extras

As you can see in the pictures above, our boys aren't fans of loud noises. Our older boy has always had a hard time with loud noises. For that reason, he's never liked fireworks. The 4-year old has liked fireworks for the last couple of years, but this year he seems to have learned from his big brother that loud things are scary. So at the parades, they get Grandma and Grandpa to help them hold their ears.

For the last few years, one of the last entries in the Farmington Festival Days parade has been throwing out stuffed animals.

This year's Bountiful Handcart Days Parade featured an entry with over 2000 young men dressed to honor the principles embodied by the 2060 Stripling Warriors, who fought valiantly for their liberty (see Alma 56-58 in the Book of Mormon).

If you stick around after Kaysville's 4th of July Parade you can participate in what might be the largest community water fight in Davis County (if you know better, please let us know). Check Kaysville's community events pages to see which section of the route will be the water section of the parade.