May Day Circus Float

 

My friend, Kerry, and I decided to do another float for Lillooet's annual May Day Parade.

A couple of years ago we did Candyland Float and had so much fun we decided to participate again.

It is a lot of work but, I have to say, seeing the looks on all the kids' faces is worth the effort.

I thought I would share a few photos from our float this year.

The above photo is helper Taylor (in purple), then nephew Nick (clown), Me (popcorn lady), niece Kenzie (in purple), Kerry (clown), and Kerry's hubby, Marcel (lion tamer). We are standing at the back of our float.

 

I made a large, paper mache giraffe for the front of the float. We named him Gerome. The following photos are of him in his various stages of prep.

 

 

Here is Gerome's wood and chicken wire skeleton. Pretty sad looking so far....

 

Here is Gerome's head, some crumpled up newspapers and a cereal box. Again...not very giraffe-y yet....

 

This is the first layer of paper mache going on. Looks pretty much like a llama at this point, yes?

 

 

Just attached Gerome's finished head. The added height definitely makes him look more giraffe-y, less llama-y.

 

 

*tah-dah*

Gerome all painted and ready for his debut.

I had to share this baby giraffe I made too. Kenzie really, really wanted to keep Gerome but I had already promised my nephew, Jord, he could have him. I made Kenzie a baby giraffe so she wouldn't feel left out.

 

 

A few paper towel rolls, a cereal box, and a balloon and we have a baby giraffe skeleton.

 

A couple of layers of paper mache and some bright yellow paint and she is starting to look pretty cute.

 

Some sparkly black felt and some googly eyes and Tyra (Kenzie named her) comes to life.

 

 

She turned out so cute.

 

For an extra touch I added a little purple bow to her tail.

And, for a last paper mache project for the float I made some weights for our strong man.

 

 

There is the first step of the weights. Some cereal boxes and paper towel rolls taped together and paper mached.

 

 

There is our strong man with his finished weights.

Kerry made a lion cage for the float out of one of her kid's wagons and some rolls of cellophane wrap.

 

 

We used some red and white dollar store table clothes to make our circus tent.

It looked so adorable.  We added a large, stuffed monkey, some balloons, a stuffed giraffe hanging from a hoola hoop and many more little animals plus we had some helper animals to throw out candy...

 

 

A lion, monkey, giraffe, 2 tight rope walkers, another clown....

Adorable factor of about a million right there.

 

 

There is Gerome heading up the float with Me, Nick, and Kenz. Nick handed out balloons to kids, I handed out caramel popcorn, Kenz & Taylor handed out cotton candy and rice krispie treats.

Another friend, Amanda, made us about 30 balloon animals to hand out to kids too.

Our friends are fantastic. :)

Sue didn't join on us this year but she did manage to share some love with Gerome.

 

 

And, one more of our float climbing a hill to pass by the hospital and old folk's home.

 

 

We got our exercise walking the parade route, for sure.

We had saved some cute little happy face balloons to hand out at the old folk's home and hospital.

 

 

There's Kenz and Nick handing out the balloons. (You can see one of the balloons at the side of the photo.) They were a big hit.

Kerry and I had so much fun coming up with all the circus themed ideas. Our lovely helpers were amazing! I think they had fun too.

Can't wait to see what we do next time!

I will leave you with a shot of our Candyland float from the previous parade.

 

 

We do tend to favor the bright and colorful, don't we?

 

Be sure to stop by The Chicken Chick and Ms. en Place for some exciting links!