Hometown Parade Float | A Bathroom Evolution

The entire crew before the parade.

How many of you grew up in a small town? Did you have a hometown festival in the summer? My hometown has a parish festival on the 4th of July. I have the best childhood memories of the 4th. As children, my sister and I would ride our bikes to the end of the block and look down the street to see if the big striped tents were being set up. When we caught the first glimpse of those tents going up we would get really excited, even though it still meant the festival was days away. I remember doing extra chores around the house so we could get extra money to play games. The morning of the 4th our elderly neighbor would open his windows and blast big band music so all could hear. The first event the morning of the 4th was the race, lucky for us the runners route was one block up from where we lived. My sister and I would run through the yards and stand along the edge of the road and wave as runners passed by us. Next, the parade participants would line up down our street. We would head out and find our place along the curb on the main street so we could catch candy or we would ride on the back of the firetruck (my Dad was a volunteer Fireman) and we would toss out candy. To be honest, the parade was full of mostly tractors, tow trucks and firetrucks. After the parade there was games to play and a mini-Ferris wheel to ride. Sooo much excitement. I remember walking back our house at the end of the day with all my treasures in hand feeling super happy. At night I would lay in my bed, the windows open so I could hear the distant sound of the polka band playing under that big striped tent.

Six years ago I took my first child to the festival on the 4th. She was only a baby and we couldn’t stay outside too long because the heat that day was so unbearable. I remember telling my sister (who was pregnant) that one day it would be fun to build a float and walk the parade with our kids. This year we did it! My hometown is celebrating their 175th Anniversary, so we decided to enter a float. The theme was A Journey Through Time and we added A Bathroom Evolution. My Dad owns a plumbing business so we decided to create a float with toilets from different eras. We had an outhouse, an avocado green toilet, a mauve toilet and a white toilet. To add more fun to the float we added a Toilet Bowl Queen; with a dress crafted from toilet paper, a plunger scepter, and a toilet paper tube crown. (My sister-in-law to be was a great sport!) We all wore matching t-shirts that I designed that had my Dad’s business name and phone number and said “Your Hometown Plumber Since 1939.”

I can honestly say we all had a blast! The kids decorated their bicycles and drove behind the float throwing out candy (we walked next to them). It was genuinely fun and it was great to see the crowds reaction as our float rolled past them. We ended up winning first place.