National Tom Sawyer Days

\July brings an influx of people from all over to Hannibal to celebrate and participate in the National Tom Sawyer days--we didn't attend too many of the festivities, but we did go to the parade (Alex thought candy being thrown and handed out and stuffed into his pockets quite the exciting affair). At the end of the parade people were dumping their buckets of candy--we let the kids get as much as they wanted-over and over again. Alex was screaming "hooray" and pumping his fists over his head as he went back time and time again to fill his pockets. We browsed through the vendors at the farmers market (which by the way--when did a farmers market turn from locally grown food to everything from fish made from coconut shells to rock jewelry to clothing?) This was all after our branch breakfast and flag raising ceremony the morning of the 4th of July. Later that afternoon we went to our neighbors for swimming and BBQ. Alex finally tried trusting the life vest he was wearing he found out that he could float AND swim! He was so excited and spent the rest of the time we were there in the pool--except for brief outtings for chips and juice. He was so cute and so estatic about it. He can't wait to go again. We bought a swim suit that has built in flotation for Savanna so it was nice to not have to be as stressed about her wandering around.
That Saturday we headed downtown again to watch the frog jumping contests. For a small fee you could use one of the frogs from a local boy scout group or you could bring your own. Frogs were set in the middle of a tarp with a bullseye pattern drawn on it. You made the frog jump three times and they would measure from the center circle to the third jump spot. The best parts were when the frog would finally catch a glimpse of escape and take off into the surrounding crowd. We wandered over and watched a little bit of mud volleyball (teams from all over come for this competition), a little bit of the fence painting contest and shared a big snowcone. Alex was kindly sharing little bites off the end of one of those spoon straws with Savanna. Well she saw a better option and started grabbing handfulls of the snowcone--a much better option, she thought.
We didn't take on the challenge of the "Hannibal Cannibal" a 5K run that takes you up to the top of "Lover's Leap" quite a climb at the end of a 5K. Maybe next year?
Speaking of 5Ks we found one that is put on in St Louis that is zombie themed--but instead of you having the option of dressing up, there are zombies planted throughout a mud-run type course--so it is zombie survival at its best. Keith is thinking of training for it.