Parade a dazzler
Despite cold, rain, determined crowd cheers on floats

Santa waves from his sleigh during the Grants Christmas Parade on Saturday evening. [Photo by Brian Leddy/Independent]

By Karen Francis
Diné Bureau

Christine Gose hugs Amber and Heather Hollar as they and others stand by a fire in Grants as they wait for the start of the Christmas parade on Saturday evening. [Photo by Brian Leddy/Independent]

GRANTS — In spite of the cold weather and on-and-off raining throughout the day, people braved the elements and came out for the annual Grants Christmas Light Parade.

As if the smiles from the crowd and the parade participants weren’t enough, the floats lighted up the night with dazzling displays of Christmas decorations.

Hundreds of people lined the road to catch a glimpse of the many floats that made their way to the Fire and Ice Park on Santa Fe Avenue before the community lighting of the first city Christmas tree.

While there have been years when 25 or more entries show up, about 10 floats were a part of this year’s parade.

With the theme “Let Freedom Ring with the Bells of Christmas,” the local JROTC were on hand with a float and horse riders.

The Los Alamitos Middle School Native American Club brought out about 20 children for its float.

“They keep showing up,” Scottlin Platero, who was on the float, said. “It doesn’t make a difference,” he added about the inclement weather.

Roger Sanders was with the Boy Scouts of America float with his two children.

“It’s pretty good,” he said about the weather. “I think the kids like it.”

More than 20 others piled onto the float.

The cold weather couldn’t dampen the spirit of the Grants High School Dance Team, but the team members were bundled under blankets to keep warm.

“I think it’s actually pretty nice,” Vanessa Calzada said as she waited for the parade to start. She and Marisol Chavez are members of the dance team and helped to put the float together.

“It took us quite awhile,” Calzada said. “We put our hearts and souls into it.”

Two banks had entries including Wells Fargo and Grants State Bank.

Ron Williams, who just became president of Grants State Bank in April, said that the bank was trying to get more involved in the community.

He said that employees and their family members built the float since the day before and were on the float even as the rain was drizzling down.

“We thought it was going to clear up,” he said. “We got here and there’s a major rainstorm.”

The grand finale was Santa Claus, who rode a sleigh driven by reindeer atop one of the floats handing out candy canes.

Raymond King played Santa this year.

“The Native American Santa,” King said with a laugh. He even wore mock turquoise as he sat in the sleigh. King had come with the Native American Club but agreed to be Santa for the final entry of the parade.