#337 Pancake Day.
When I was little, on the first Saturday of every December, my family would go downtown for Pancake Day and the Christmas Parade. I remember being so excited to see Santa, the cars and the marching bands. I bet my parents were cold and miserable, but they never let us know it. I always thought downtown was magical since we lived in a very rural part of the county and rarely went downtown for reasons other than Pancake Day. It was always Jitney Jungle, the mall, Wal-Mart and McDonald’s that brought us into town.
Now we live on the parade route and a couple doors down from the YWCO, and Pancake Day has a new excitement. My family and lots of their friends started a new tradition at our house a few years ago. We open the windows, turn on the Christmas music and sit in the windowsill to see the parade. We get so used to seeing the 20 or so same folks downtown everyday, but today is special. There were hundreds of people waiting in line on Oak Street to get inside the Y’s doors for those delicious pancakes and sausage:
The longest line I’ve ever seen at Pancake Day.
Mama and Daddy know EVERYBODY.
Everyone you’ve ever known in your whole life is in this room. It’s like at the end of Big Fish.
Mmmmm…. all you can eat.
Then it was back across the street to our house for the parade!
Our church’s little Living Nativity float:
Party like it’s 1865.
By far, my favorite parade attraction: The Jones County Horse Club. Quite a stampede they’ve got there.
Aunt Linda showed up at the end:
It’s Chanty Chaws!
Aunt Cheryl, Mama and Aunt Trisha. Neither of these women are my biological aunts, but they are mama’s oldest friends. LOVE them!
“Let’s take a picture of everybody! Use the timer thing!”
Michael Jordan (swear, seriously, that’s his name and he is my un-biological uncle), with his precious grandson Connor.
Such a morning requires an afternoon nap and some Duke watching for Ben. See you tomorrow, sweet readers!
