ISU Homecoming 2009

Illinois State's Homecoming was a couple of weeks ago. Every year the festivities get bigger and better. As an employee, I get to participate in a few events during the week, but this year we went to the parade for the first time as a family and I competed in the Great Urban Race with my friend, Amanda.

Great Urban Race

For those of you that don't know what this is, the race is a local, one-day version of The Amazing Race. The Amazing Race is one of my favorite shows and I've always wanted to go on it. The day of the race was in the lower 40's with light rain at times. As cold as it was, it actually felt good since we were on the move the whole time. The race consisted of two-person teams that had to dress alike, preferably in costume and each team had to completed 11/12 tasks in any order. The kicker is that you can only move from one task by foot or by bus. The tasks took us anywhere from taking a picture with Reggie at the ISU Rec Center, completing a murder-mystery riddle at Often Running, piggy-backing at McDonald's, line dancing in downtown Bloomington, finding a misspelled poster at US Cellular Coliseum, and lots of other fun tasks at locations in downtown Bloomington and Normal. We ended up running the majority of the race, with exception of a bus from downtown Bloomington back to Normal! We literally ran from the starting line in North Normal at the ISU Alumni Center, around Normal, and then all the way into Bloomington. We probably ran 5-6 miles in total!! That's a lot of running! We had so much fun competing in the race and I can't wait to do it again next year.

Piggybacking under the McD's sign as one of the tasks

Posing with a "Lincoln"

Finish line!

Homecoming Parade

The next day we took the kids to the parade and had a great time. We stayed an hour-and-a-half and the parade was still going when we left. This was Jacob's first parade and he had a blast. We gave him his Halloween pumpkin to collect candy and he quickly understood what to do! He got so much candy it was ridiculous. One lady came by and tried to put some candy in his pumpkin and he said "noooo!" and pushed her hand away because he didn't want anyone near his candy! It should be even more fun next year when Bailey can get into the action :)

Before the parade

Picking up candy

Reggie float

Jacob's loot!!