Indy Eleven - Carmel Parade

Every so often, things come together in my life that make me surprised.  Like having one of the greatest friends in the world, whose step-mom happens to help organize the Carmel Fourth of July parade and asks him to drive the truck carrying the Grand Marshal, and said best friend asks if you want to tag along.  Who were the Grand Marshals? 

The Indy Eleven!

I didn't get to hang with the team much.  They were at breakfast and then they all left pretty quickly once the parade was over, but it was cool to see the reception they received from right alongside of them.  They're all really nice people (that's to be able to include the female staff that were there too) and really seemed to be having fun being in the parade. 

How cool is that!?  Not only to have the chance to be in a parade, but to be hanging out with your favorite sports team.  I love that the family got to join along too as my girls got to spend a lot of time with the mascot Zeke and have fun in a way that kids rarely have the opportunity during normal games.  With my kids' memories, hopefully this was an experience they will never forget.

There was one blip in the day and that was that the team didn't bring along enough stuff to throw out to all of the kids that were along the parade route.  Given that this was their first parade (I think), they just didn't know what to expect from it.  From everything that I have seen from the Indy Eleven, this will be something that they will remedy for any future parade excursions.  Even during the Carmel parade, they were doing as best they could.  Once they ran out of the normal goodies, the team did everything they could along the rest of the route.  They passed out the posters that were on top of the float.  They passed out the water bottles that they had on the float for themselves.  They went into the crowds to take selfies with the kids. 

And one of my favorite moments?  As the float approached a Circle K gas station long after they had run out of their goodies, one of the Indy Eleven staff jumped off and headed towards it.  A few minutes later, he jumped back on with a bag full of more candy.  That, once again, says a lot to me about this team and the organization.  Apparently, they never give up on the field nor off of it.




Thanks @Deckard2021 for the invite and one of the photos used in this post!