47 this morning, overcast. We finally closed the doors around midnight, as temperatures began to drop. Rain expected today.
I realized that I had skipped over the Christmas parade when I began the posts about the house tour. So here it is.
Ripley is our closest town, and the county seat. It is a parade-happy town, like many small towns. There is a chocolate festival parade, the huge 4th of July parade, a Veterans Day parade, a homecoming parade, and maybe one or two others besides the Christmas parade. People turn out for them, and children love them, of course, mostly because of the candy thrown from the parade entrants.
When I was a child, the Manassas Christmas parade was always at night. It was long, with many beautiful floats, no candy that I can recall, several bands, marching units of twirled, lots of fire trucks and sirens, and at the end, Santa riding on the biggest fire truck of all. It was always cold as could be, often snow on the ground, and afterward we'd dash home for hot chocolate. It was the highlight of pre-Christmas for us.
Ripley's parade had been a daytime event for years, probably a nod to the county's large farming community. But times and culture change. Today our county has more commuters to Charleston than there are farmers. Technology has made being away from home after dark not as problematic for country people, and of there is the advent of battery powered Christmas lights that make the parade a brightly lit and colorful event.
This parade is not as big as the ones the town has hosted in the past. Only one band, but a good one. The Ripley high school marching band is huge for a school of less than a thousand kids...about 100 are in the band!
There were few floats, but they were nice. No twirled, sadly, possibly because it's hard to see those batons in the dark? There weren't many antique cars either, which was surprising, no military units, no Scouts. But there was a large number of horses, most all decorated up with lights, just beautiful animals, but a little hard to see at night. The lights helped a bit.
We had a great time watching the parade and visiting with friends who were there with us. It has been a while since we went to any parade. Being there and enjoying it all surely brought back many memories.
The parade looks like a fun time.
ReplyDeleteGreat parade
ReplyDeleteFun parade!
ReplyDelete