Monarch Meltdown

The Texas sun shone brightly upon us, as the Autumn air fought to keep a hint of its crisp edge for the crowd as we descended upon picturesque Mainstreet Grapevine. The parade began with a troupe of merry bagpipers, filling the air with song. My eyes welled up at the sight of them in their best Scottish regalia, red kilts and stark white socks with their polished black shoes. Trailing behind the pipers were tiny kids awash in their lepidopterous finery, with gossamer wings adorning their backs, and garlands of sunflowers in their hair. Even the canines took part in the wing-wearing. It was quite a moving, magnificent display of hometown pride. I was beaming, and so happy to be sharing such an occasion with my son.

And my son?

He couldn't have been less impressed.

And then he went from less-than-impressed to one mad little Monarch.

He threw a full-scale meltdown tantrum while we waited for the butterflies to be released. Luckily, his lack of decorum was well worth the wait. Not a bit of the clear blue sky could be seen once the myriad of Monarchs were set free to begin their journey. It was truly an overwhelming, almost-spiritual sight to behold.

Or not. There were like ten butterflies. Whoo. Hoo.

Seriously, I think my favorite part of the morning were the bagpipers. I mean, who doesn't love a great bagpiping band? (Ok, I know, a LOT of people don't. But not me, I seriously LOVE bagpipes). Maybe they remind me of my ancestors. Or maybe they remind me of Mike Meyers' dad/Mike Meyers in 'So I Married An Axe Murderer' and I just can't help but sing the Bay City Rollers song in my head. Either way, I love a bagpipe.

Truth be told, we kind of knew exactly the rough waters we were treading into. Strike one, Dresden was throwing bloody-murder tantrums at home before we even got him in the car. He was having fun playing with Grammy, and we made him go see some dumb butterfly parade. Seriously, what were we thinking? Strike two, if there are animals of any kind in sight, little man is NOT going to sit quietly in his stroller and watch them go by. And man were there a LOT of butterfly-dogs. Strike three - the clincher for any bad experience we've ever had with Dresden - the parade started right at 10 a.m. What's wrong with 10 a.m. you might ask? Only that it's prime NAP time. Need I say more? Didn't think so. We fell pray to one of the classic blunders (outside of starting a land war with Asia), and tried to force our idea of a fun, scheduled butterfly-filled day on our poor toddler. Believe me, we will never make this same mistake again. (While there are no pictures as proof, I promise you we were getting stares like we were abusing our child while we were trying to get him buckled into his stroller several times. The Red Hat Society's stares were particularly judgmental and glaring. Hmph!)

So, there you have it. The much anticipated Monarch Migration festival post. HA!

Have a great weekend!

Love,

Cassie, Alex and Dresden