Saturday night...

...in Atlanta at the Lantern Parade. Daughter and I did it last year, and found ourselves so amused we thought to go again, a little better prepared. Meaning more planning invested in creating some type lighted/glow in the dark device to be 'lantern like'. It  was entertaining, but also chaotic and general, all-purpose bedlam. If there were someway to eliminate any of a number of factors, I would do it again. But the combination of kids, dogs, alcohol, tens of thousands of on-lookers all added up to Too Much Fun.

I'd thought about what would be a good idea, and planned it out, just failed to act in a timely manner. I could probably give Lessons in Procrastination. My little papier mache lanterns turned out ok. But if F. had not provided some wee lights to insert, dangle on the string that would hold the lantern onto the umbrella frame, it would have been a bust. My plan was to put glow sticks in the papier mache globes, but they would not have provided enough light, been bright enough to be effective. I only made five of the translucent globes, putting squares of tissue paper on the slightly inflated balloons, to make a sphere about 5ive inches in diameter. Wished I had started the project sooner, and made enough to be able to have a dozen dangling from the spokes of the umbrella.

We popped the balloons, poked holes in the solid end (without the knot from the balloon) and threaded the string/dental floss through with teeny battery operated lights tied on the end. Tied them to the ends of the ribs of the now undressed umbrella. I debated about taping the umbrella handle onto a long pole (tomato stake) but thought it would not fit into the car. But later, after walking a couple of miles with twenty thousand of my close-est friends, got so tired of holding the umbrella overhead I wished I had used the duct tape, after leaving the pole at the house.

It was amusing. But I think I'm done.