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A top flight costume for Halloween
MARCHING ON A MISSION – Monday was a top flight day for a Halloween parade and La Connerites small and large turned out for the annual event. There were lots of masks but almost none of them were of the N95 variety. The new normal looks exactly like the old normal.
COLORS OF THE BLUES AND PURPLES VARIETY – Black, too, of course, goes with purple hair and purple candy baskets for this matching pair marching down First Street Monday.
H-M-M-M, WHICH ONE TO CHOOSE – So many choices and such a small hand to take just one. Mary Hedlin was the good fairy giving out candy Monday after the Halloween parade in La Conner.
LINE UP KIDS FOR YOUR TREATS – Mary Hedlin draws a crowd, as she would even if she was not the last stop on the street before the post office. No one would say the costumed children are suckers for her candy.
AN ITALIAN EMBRACING AN AMERICAN TRADITION – That pink bowl Raf is holding is a colander. Look closely for the holes. The co-owner of Sempre Italiano had as much fun as the kids taking handfuls of treats.
IN LA CONNER THE ANNUAL HALLOWEEN PARADE IS A FAMILY AFFAIR – And, just like in the old days, the best and most interesting costumes are home made, though you cannot go wrong with a an 8-foot tall Tyrannosaurus rex.
It was a dark and stormy Sunday night, but Monday at noon the breeze abated and the clouds lifted just before La Conner's school children took to First Street for the annual Halloween Parade. They were safe, for once again La Conner Hook & Ladder – many of them parents of school aged children – blocked First Street to traffic
In typical La Conner fashion, it was an all-in, all-ages costume ball, with toddlers and elders alike dressed as scary, strange, other worldly, puffed up and cute. And there were at least two dogs outfitted, of course, one with a lion's mane, befitting the king of beasts, the other with taco shells – go figure.
Notable costumes included: a Black Plague doctor, Spiderman, grim reaper, Franciscan friar, firefighters, a devil and angel walking side-by-side, two girls each sporting an M walking side-by-side as M&Ms, several inflatable dinosaurs, an inflatable unicorn, a toddler dressed out in a homemade Edward Scissorhands costume, Mark Twain and Crocodile Hunter Steve Corwin.
There was a modern minister and a cardinal of the species Catholic. There were super heroes and space girls, Harry Potter and star war stars, monsters, vampires and Thor.
The paraders marched down First Street to Commercial by 12:15 p.m. and took the next half hour to come back up on the sidewalks – those wanting candy took that route. Others stayed in the street.
Some parents were more candy focused than their kids.
And candy abounded, in baskets and plastic pumpkins of various colors. Heather Smith passed out bags of sweet popcorn, which on other days she sells next to her store.
Merchants made the most of a cloudy Monday afternoon to sugar up the school district's children and adults.
The weather forecast had called for rain and wind gusts. Fortunately, those held off. The stormy weather hit Mount Vernon instead.
The kids had the entire afternoon off. The La Conner Schools quarter ended Monday with an early release date. A trunk-or-treat event followed at 1 p.m. at John K. Bob Ball Park on Swinomish Reservation. Shelter Bay likewise offered a trunk-or-treat at 6 p.m. in the parking lot next to the community clubhouse.
None of that was needed. Rain, a full school day would not have mattered. Suzie Racanello, holding her grandson Robert's astronaut helmet that had just a bit of candy for her in it agreed, it was the best half hour all year in La Conner once again.
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