The Orangeville Santa Clause Parade was today. For the past three years our ward has put together a float. Or rather, Rene and few other guys have built a float. Last year we were Mary and Joseph with Lucienne as baby Jesus. This year I was a shephard, Amelia was a goat, and Evelyn, Audree and Lucienne were time travellers from the 21st century. In other words, they refused to wear costumes. I figured smiling children was more important that period costumes so I didn't push it too hard.
Leading up to the float was a mass of miscommunication and mayhem. People weren't where they were suppose to be, there was confusion on what time the parade actually started (it was an hour earlier this year) and keys to the chapel were forgotten. The float was built, it had no lights, costumes were forgotten but once remembered were locked in the attic of the chapel with no key holders in town. We walked the staging ground of the floats for an hour, met up with other members but our float was not there and the parade was due to start within 1/2 an hour. When the float finally arrived (which also meant we were near the back of the parade making the night even longer for all the kids...waiting to start) there were still no costumes. Rene decided to go back to the chapel to try his locksmithing skills. That left me with the four girls and our dog (yes, we brought Paris). Popular items on a float are babies and dogs so we thought we'd play the crowds this year with both. 5 minutes after he left a couple of the guys came back with costumes in hand (I guess he's not the only one able to break in). This is one of the few times I've wished we were more of a cell phone family.
I got a little antsy as the parade started and no Rene. I guess it was lucky we were near the end so it would give him more time but I couldn't figure out how I was going to hold Lucienne and walk the dog and keep Audree happy. Just as it was about our turn Rene shows up on rollerblades. He figured out that the costumes had been found but then had to figure out how to get to the staging area on time. Turns out rollerblades are crowd pleasers too so we were covering lots of bases.
In true style, Audree was asleep about 5 minutes into the parade (she's done that every year). Lucienne decided she'd rather walk so spent 80% of the parade crying and trying to get out of my arms. We had mini candy canes for the kids in the crowds but I spent the time I wasn't wrestling Luci unwrapping the candy for the 10 kids on the float. I toyed with the idea of getting off half way and heading home (the route is about a 5 minutes walk from home at one point) but couldn't get my roller-blading-wise-man-husband's attention to get his keys so I carried on.
The end is always the hardest. The parade doesn't end where it started so the positioning of the car is key. If you park at the beginning then you've got to hike over there at the end of the parade and if you park at the finish you've got to give yourself enough time to get to the start. The latter was our plan this year until costumes were MIA and everything was running late. I'm always left sitting with cold, tired, hungry children, waiting for Rene to fetch the van. Early in the day I had made an off-hand comment that in the time it took to sort out the car I could just walk home. Turns out this year he took that to heart and had parked the car at home and rollerbladed to the starting line. However, I hadn't included details like if we were going that route I'd make sure to have a stroller for the sleeping 3-year-old and cranky 1-year-old not to mention the fact the other two would be cold, tired and hungry. So once again, we waited in the cold while Rene rollarbladed home to get the van. At least this year it wasn't raining. I remember last year huddling under some soffits of a garage to keep out of the cold, slushy rain, singing Christmas carols to the girls trying to keep them from crying with a 6 month old baby trying to nurse. Fun times.
There has to be a better way. I hope at least we're creating warm, Christmas memories for the girls.
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