Best Fourth of July Ever - Reason #2

As I said before, we had four days' worth of adventures on the Fourth of July.  As soon as we were finished at the Balloon Fest we walked to University Avenue with our friends.  We arrived just before the parade started at 9am.  People lay out blankets and section off portions of grass days in advance, so we weren't sure if we were going to find a decent place to sit.  We did find a place with a pretty good view, but it came with the catch of facing the sun the entire time... we were pretty warm.  But it was a good parade, and the kids enjoyed it, so we endured.

What a good looking family.  Are the father and son wearing matching shirts?
Wow. They must be really cool.

Hold on to your hats, folks.  This is gonna be good.

Colonial soldiers

Llamas!

Native Americans

Miniature rail car being pulled by a large tractor

"Meet Me at the Fair"

The Jetsons - one of several balloons

No Fourth of July parade is complete without an undertaker riding past. 

U of U float - yes, it was boo'ed, even though I thought it was pretty cool.

Something I can honestly say I've never seen before - a group of mounted gymnasts. Only in Utah? 

The floats carrying the city royalty from around Utah County were the prettiest.  Except for Lehi.  They must have missed the memo.  We're going for glitz and glitter, not cowboys and rodeo clowns, people.

Eliza's favorite was the Madagascar-themed Primary Children's Medical Center float.
And she'd never seen a Madagascar movie...

I got a kick out of the variety of musical floats, and of course I loved the pipe & drum groups and the marching bands. 

Hi, fire engine!

Miscellaneous famous people -
top - Stephanie Nielsen of the Nie Nie dialogues was the grand marshal (I don't follow her blog, but I searched and saw that she blogged about it here)
middle - US Senator Orrin Hatch and his wife Elaine
bottom - Utah Governor Gary Herbert and his family

The kids had a really good time.  We contemplated leaving early because it was hot and we were running out of water, but they really wanted to stay until the end.  I'm so glad they enjoyed it!