Memorial Day Moment

Our town has an annual Memorial Day parade. It is a very cheesy, small town thing, but it is part of the fiber of our small town. Izaac was in the parade since he is a Boy Scout. Basically, you follow the parade from the town square to the cemetary (about a mile walk).

DH was helping my dad with something, so I was flying solo with the two little ones. We have a very nice, rather expensive double stroller that my little "angel" occasionally views a torture device. So, of course, since I was flying solo....it was one of those occasions. Fine, she could walk (considering in her flailing she was liable to injure our perfectly well behaved little man).

While we were standing around waiting for things to get going she started complaining about her sandals. Well, I'm no dummy (ha ha), I had a spare pair of shoes in the car. Those shoes were apparently nine thousand times worse. Me, being the Love and Logic loving parent that I am decided, "Fine, walk barefoot". Thinking there is no way that she'd walk a mile barefoot. Either the shoes or the stroller would win.

Now here is where I need to interject that my daughter is the most strong willed person I've ever met. I fully expect her to go on a two year hunger strike to end the use of Q-tips if the feeling strikes her. I should also add that my very good friend had to work and had called me that morning asking if her DH could tag along with me at the parade so I could "help" him (you girls know that men aren't always capable of taking a little one in public right?).

Not even a quarter of the way there, Avery stubs her toe. I know it hurt her, but she has far too much pride to admit defeat and wince. At this point, she begins leaving DNA evidence (AKA blood) throughout the town of obvious parental neglect (making a two year old walk barefoot over a mile). So, I make multiple attempts to either 1) pick her up and carry her, 2) put her in the stroller or 3) put one of the perfectly good pairs of shoes on. No, not my daughter. Thank God, we live in a small town and most of the people around us were family friends (who were getting a huge laugh about this....Avery's perserverance was common knowledge....this incident, I believe, bumped it up to legendary). And, my friends DH, he just kept saying how this was proof that they only need one child.