Pasadena Update #3
Well, it was back to sunshine again here in Southern
California! And we all enjoyed it a lot more than the rainy weather yesterday.
Today was our last day working on the floats for the parade and we spent extra
time making them look spectacular.
Last night, 10 members of our group went back to the Rose
Palace to continue working on some unfinished floats as they needed to be
completed before the judging was done this morning at 8:00 a.m. Some floats,
such as the Lutheran Hour float, were completed before the group arrived at
11:00 PM Our group members continued working on floats that the Petal Pushers
agreed to decorate until 2:30 this morning. (As you may or may not know, the
Petal Pusher volunteers decorate a number of floats for other companies. The money received for decorating those
floats pays for the cost of the Lutheran Hour float. Brilliant idea!!) Then they headed back to the hotel. They said
that the freeways were a lot easier to travel then they are during rush hour!! They slept in a little longer than the rest of
us, but went back to the Palace to continue working on the floats at 10:00 this
morning.
The rest of the group, who didn’t go back to work last
night, headed to Rosemont (This is right by the Rose Bowl stadium where the
football game is played!) today to work on the Honda float.
The floats are all motorized and driven by someone inside of
the float. We got to watch as they pulled four of the floats out of the
building and onto the street. Some floats have pieces that are too tall, so
they are motorized to fold up and down. It’s interesting to watch them move up
and get into place with nobody physically moving them. All of these moving
pieces have to be let down every time there is a bridge or anything that it
could run into. This means there’s a lot of things to be timed just right so
nothing falls and breaks off.
All of the floats at Rosemont had to be done by 4:00, as
that’s when judging was, but we left mid-morning to head to the Rose Palace and
continue working on the floats over there. We met the rest of our group at the
Palace and worked on the City of L.A. and Western Assets floats as they still
needed to be finished before the parade tomorrow. Apparently, since they weren’t
done at 8:00 a.m., they were judged unfinished, but we still came back and
finish them. By the time we got there, many volunteers and crew leaders had
already left, so we were working with those filling in who didn’t know much
about the float decorations. This made it confusing to figure out what to do
and which kinds of flowers and seeds needed to be placed in the specific areas.
It was a slower process than what we were used to, but we still managed to get
a lot accomplished on these floats.
We heard that the reason that the floats were not finished
yesterday is because a couple groups of volunteers who promised to work did not
show up so…IOWAY to the rescue!!!!
Before we left, we got a group picture in front of the
Lutheran Hour float. It was amazing to see how much work was done on it after
we left yesterday! It really is a work of God. Make sure to watch HGTV tomorrow
morning to see our float. It is the 7th one in the parade, so it
should be on towards the beginning of the broadcast!
Hopefully everything works out tomorrow morning and we’ll be
sitting right on the edge of Colorado Boulevard with a great view of the
parade. We’re leaving the hotel at 5:00 a.m. with hopes of getting there early
enough to find parking spaces that aren’t too far away. We’ll be all bundled up
tomorrow morning as Pasadena is supposed to be near an all-time low of 32
degrees. Hopefully it warms up by the time the parade starts and we can
continue enjoying this beautiful weather!
Happy New Year from Los Angeles!
Jeni Zeller-Journalist
Ellie Menz-Photos
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