Light Up Norwin || Downtown Irwin, PA || 2021

As much as I’m in denial that it’s already the middle of November (isn’t it just the beginning of October?) I am definitely here for the fact that tonight was Light Up Night & that means it’s officially the holiday season.

Don’t get me wrong: despite the fact that I feel like I lost a few weeks of my life somewhere (can you say: “fall as a photographer”?) we have been in (almost) full-blown holiday mode for a few weeks now.
Pretty much since the beginning of November (also known as, the end of Daylight Savings Time), we put up our Christmas lights outside & strung up lights all around the inside of our house. Our tree is up (although there are no ornaments on it yet – my rule is: the tree can be up, but no ornaments until after Leander’s birthday) and overall, our house feels more & more festive.

And tonight, our little town got it’s “festive” on too with our annual Light Up Norwin Parade!

It was definitely interesting walking down to the parade this year – remembering what it felt like last year. Last year, the crowd was noticeably smaller than usual, temperatures were noticeably warmer than usual, people were social distancing, masks were worn by most of the crowd, and the parade was just a fraction of it’s usual size.
Well, thankfully, this year things definitely seemed much more normal! The crowd was back, the parade was more of it’s typical length, and it was cold (but that’s okay, it might take us 30 minutes to get all of our layers on, but we were all warm!)

We had a blast counting down to light the Christmas Tree & then watching the parade with my Mom, Ellen, Jonathan, Alethea, and Layla.
The highlight of the entire parade was seeing my Dad driving my Grandpa’s old “blue truck”, with all of our cousins loaded in the back – and my brother Stephen driving another Eichelberger & Sons Heating & Air Conditioning work truck behind.

As we walked down onto Main Street – we found Malachi & Nate! They were in charge of flipping the breaker to light to Christmas light garlands along Main Street!

Here’s my Dad!!

It’s now officially the holidays! Merry Christmas!