Mardi Gras--The Night Parades

I can't think of any other time in my life I've been to a parade at night until I moved to New Orleans. The fact that the parades during Mardi Gras season are mostly at night makes it all the more unique. It adds to the charm in my opinion. So, with Grandma & Grandpa in tow, we headed out to some parades when the rain finally let up. Since it had rained previously, there was some re-scheduling, which meant that the first night was hosting 3 parades instead of 2....and it was FREEZING cold. And I am one who can definitely handle the cold just fine, but believe me, it was really really cold. So we did our best to bundle up the boys and be prepared as much as possible and the lifesaver ended up being the pair of hand warmers we scored at WalMart that day--the very last pair they had. I don't think we would have lasted much more than one parade if it weren't for those. They saved the boys, for sure.

Annnnd, this year we finally broke down and got us a ladder box. It made me question why in the world we hadn't done this before. It is, hands down, the best way to watch a parade with kids. And you get thrown SO much stuff because the riders on the floats can see you. It was great!
So, the first night of parades we watched Hermes, D'Etat, and Muses. It was getting really late towards the end of Muses and we headed home with about 5 floats left. I was amazed that the boys held out as long as they did. They were all great parades, but Muses was probably my favorite this year and D'Etat comes in a close second. And ya know what, not one picture of any of them. It was way too cold to be thinking about catching beads, balancing on the ladder, keeping the boys warm, and taking pictures. So the only pictures from that night are these first 3...
And, on Lundi Gras we headed Uptown once again to see Proteus and Orpheus. It was still cold, but not nearly as frigid as the first night. Here is a better shot of our ladder box...since I have a hard time explaining it to anyone who I tell about it. I was able to get a few more pictures this night...

(Tyler was climbing up the ladder to get into the seat in this picture. And then usually an adult is standing on the ladder steps behind the kids.)

One of the main things I really like about the night time parades Uptown are the flambeaux torches. I'm sure it's entirely dangerous, but I think it's really cool to have the parade route lit up by them. These first pictures are from Proteus.

(this picture above is actually from Orpheus, but somehow posted out of order)

After Proteus, was Orpheus. Orpheus is one of the four "Super Krewes" and it was HUGE. The floats were enormous and it was really quite amazing. And I got very few pictures (I think every Mardi Gras leaves me thinking that I wish I could get better pictures--but with the kids and beads, it's just hard to do!!). Orpheus is Harry Connick Jr.'s krewe and there are always some big names riding in it and it's signature symbol is the harp (I think that's what it is, anyways). You can see it on top of the flambeaux torches.

There's Mr. Harry Connick Jr. himself...

And this float housed the LSU 2009 College World Series championship baseball team. And then I missed Sean Peyton and the Lombardi Trophy--yeah, I missed it...I was just putting my camera away and he was on the other side of the float anyways. Boo. But I did see him and see him hold up the trophy, if that counts. I'll just have that mental image to hold on to I suppose. And we also saw the Imagination Movers--no picture of that either. And there were some more big names as well, and I forget who they were and of course, I got no pictures. But we had a ton of fun and went home exhausted and unfortunately had to get ready to send Grandma & Grandpa home on the airplane the next morning... We made it out to parades on Fat Tuesday as well, so more to come soon!