Midwood Maynia

One of our favorite times in our neighborhood is Midwood Maynia.  It's the kind of thing that makes you proud to live where you live, have the neigbors that you do ... and never want to have to move to suburbia.

We know it might happen one day, but this is just one of the reasons that we would really mourn Plaza Midwood.  When we first moved to Charlotte, I dreaded the stereotypical Charlotte lifestyle - but our neighborhood was such a great breath of the fresh air we both hoped to find in a place we wanted to live - a neighborhood, but not one with a club house and HOA fees.  Neighbors that you can borrow butter or a cup of sugar from, but not neighbors that live so close to you that they could toss that stick of butter to you from the front porch.  And the two most important parts are: neigbors that don't look just alike, and in fact, all look quite different; and neighbors whose houses don't look just alike...but you wish your house looked like all the parts of lots of them (does this make sense?).

During Midwood Maynia, the day starts out with a Pet Parade - which is hilarious and we gave Salem our own "best behaved" dog award for herself.  Not necessarily the best behaved dog during the parade, but the best year she has ever had in the parade 4 years running - BY FAR.  The pet parade (led by the local highschool band) - the schools not being something we love about our neighborhood - ends in the park where there are festivities that last all day long: balloons, face painting, free give aways, bounce houses, ice cream, bands, food, beer, vendors, lots of people and lots of fun.  Emerson loves to be around lots of people and take it all in, and she was so excited.  She really wanted to get to go in the bounce house, but was too small - so Terry gave Emerson a bounce house of her own.  He tossed her up in the air and caught her down low, and she cracked up every time - clearly, so did he.  I love this picture of Terry & Em - don't you see what a great dad he is and how much they love each other?  It's priceless.

All of that throwing around wore everybody out, and Emerson was rewarded with one of her favorite things - ice.  But even better, shaved, flavored ice.  We tried to let her eat mostly off the top and let Terry drink all the syrup out of the bottom of the cup...but she is a smart girl, and she wanted that sugary syrup! She loved this icee!

...can you tell?

After we walked around and picked up some 'loot' and Terry guessed how many dog bones were in a jar (and came in 3rd place and won us 3 free nights for Salem of boarding!) we went and listened to the bands where Em and I danced and then we shared some food.  Emerson tried so shredded pork tacos with Terry for the first time - and loved them, but can you see who really wishes that they were getting in on the pork taco action in the photo below?  Unfortunately it was not her lucky day, she had eaten one too many board books this week...

Em

Emerson made quick friends with our neighbors at the pavillion while we listened to the bands and fell in love with a dog who was sitting in his own chair.  She would walk over and pet the dog, or just point at it and crack up laughing - she thought it was hilarious to see the dog get in and out of the chair and she just laughed and laughed every time she looked at it.  Too cute. 

Oh Plaza Midwood, how we love you and hope we do not have to leave you too soon...

Here's to more neighborhood fun times, icees, and days outside at the park!