Puppy Parade

So last week, I'm reading the newspaper and notice that there is a Pet Parade on December 4th.  That sounds like fun!  I called my mom and told her it would be fun to join in that parade. My idea was to dress Raelee as Santa and Buster as a reindeer in the sleigh.  Who's pulling who?

 So we decided to do it. We had a week to pull it together. Sooooo....in addition to all of the Christmas sewing I had to do, we took on the parade. It took us 3 days to make the float and a TON of red glitter. My yard and driveway will never look the same again. I bought the dress, the costume (yes, i could have made both, but did I mention all of the Christmas sewing I had to do? LOL), float fixins (you know, 30 bottles of red glitter *slight exaggeration here* and all), and my mom and I spent the better part of 3 days making it. Mom was the mastermind behind the whole thing...float maker extraordinaire.

The big day came and Raelee was so happy to be pulling one of her best buds behind her.

The look of one proud girl.

Buster was on his best behavior. He didn't try to jump out and chase other dogs once. We were all proud of him. He was the center of attention. Raelee was all excited that complete strangers kept wanting his picture.

We waited patiently.

It was good for Buster to see he wasn't the only one that had to be a little less of a man that day.

The two girls on the right are Mary Francis and her sister Allie, 2 of her friends around the corner from our house.

Here we go!

Making new friends.

 So...we walked a block..or was it a half a block? I'm not sure. Probably more like 1/4 a block..lol Then it was time for judging. After a very informal judging period, we learned that Raelee won FIRST place!  YAY Raelee. It was SO informal in fact, that they never asked Raelee's name (until much later), or Busters. They announced it by "the cute basset in the wagon"...rofl  What did they win? Bragging rights for the whole year...and maybe their picture in the paper.  They then got to walk around the rest of the block with the other participants. Did I mention that the rest of the block had NO bystanders? We were basically just walking for the sake of walking...lol Nobody to wave to even.  Raelee had fun though...and that's all that counts.

Victory wave!

Her friends 'The Apples" got to join her for the victory walk.  Raelee is smart. She said to the Big Apple, "Hey, do you want to pull the wagon?" Of course the Big Apple jumped on it. Raelee found somebody to do the grunt work...rofl Smart girl! I don't think the Big Apple minded though.

Running to catch up with Santa.

Buster getting love from all 3 of the Apple Girls.

Love this picture of Raelee singing to one of her favorite songs.

Dance girls Dance. They were content to just sit and twirl with the music. It was fun watching them.

So...what did we learn from this experience? Keep the float building to the Labor Day Children's parade.  Our float was WAY over decorated for this event. Next year, we'll throw some antlers on Busters head and put him on a leash to walk in the parade...or better yet, maybe we'll watch from the sidelines.

Thanks Granny for your help!

p.s. If anybody knows what to do with a VERY glittery wagon decorated to the nines, I'm all ears. I'm guessing if I try to take it apart and throw the cardboard away, I'll have one upset 7 year old on my hands...rofl