A Mormon Family at Pride: a follow up

So, the last time I had 400 hits in twelve hours on a single blog post was never, ever ago, and I'm grateful and surprised and experiencing a lot of other feelings about it.  Thank you to those who commented here, on Facebook, and Twitter, and those who shared this post.  Thank you to those who shared feelings with me in private messages.  I am honored that you shared feelings with me that are so personal and still fragile.  I especially want to say thank you to those who have a different opinion politically, but expressed that they appreciated the love that our family wanted to share.  It means so much to my family to have that recognized.

Tomorrow I'll be back to sharing my crafts and our family life (including why my son loves tights, which oddly enough, is completely unrelated to the Pride Parade), but I can't leave this topic without sharing one of my favorite moments of the day.

The sign on the other side of our stroller read "God loves ALL His children," quoting Dieter F. Uchtdorf, one of the members in our church presidency.    One of the people walking with us said it looked like a covered wagon, which was kind of accidentally appropriate to our group.  After the parade, on our way back to the train, we met with a group of protesters.  I will say that to their credit, the signs I saw didn't use the same crass language as groups like Westboro Baptist- but they weren't a whole lot better.  There was a lot of yelling going on between the groups.  My husband- I LOVE that man- took our sign proclaiming that love right into the middle of that group.  Taking advantage of his height, he stood behind the short protestor and held the sign above his head.  Cue my heart swelling with pride for the man I married, for his nerve, and the way he shared what we know is right.  I LOVE that man.

The experiences we had this day- the hugs, the people who high-fived my kid, who physically embraced us at the parade, and with words after, are ones we treasure.  We know that our opinions may differ from yours, but we hope that you will see the message of love that motivates us, that brought us there.

Tomorrow- more about my boy tights.