Post-Parade

At the end of that week the float was taken back to the barn to pull all of the flowers off, then to rip apart the figures and chalet we had worked so hard on to get the chassis ready for the next float. At the end of the decorating we had donated most of the left over flowers to local nursing homes but there still some left as the demolition work began. Better to have some left over than to run short during Deco Week!

Here the figures have been taken off the float and work is well underway on clearing the pod they once rested on. I mentioned in my description of the 2005 float how there's an incentive for kids to help tear off the foam covering. They had attacked this one like a swarm of starving locusts.

Yesterday he was a parade star, today he's on the trash can of history. Our poor squirrel didn't actually get thrown out in the trash. There was too much valuable and reusable metal inside him, so he would eventually get dissected into small metal rods and put back on the shelf.

Any lady who has had her mascara run in the rain can likely relate to our poor girl doll. It had rained while the float was on public display and while some parts of the float suffered a bit in the process, most of it help up amazingly well..

This view of the chalet with the rear wall pulled off shows how the crew that rode inside the float during the parade had a rather nice break area to spend time when not lowering or raising the house. A bench seat from a car gave them a spot to relax that was far superior to what they had to endure in some other floats. I believe they had a TV set inside and could watch the parade as they were in it, and a cooler full of drinks and snacks.