{"id":75716,"date":"2017-12-04T10:00:00","date_gmt":"2017-12-04T17:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/newcomers-yearly-participants-shine-in-parade-of-lights\/"},"modified":"2017-12-04T17:00:00","modified_gmt":"2017-12-04T17:00:00","slug":"newcomers-yearly-participants-shine-in-parade-of-lights","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/newcomers-yearly-participants-shine-in-parade-of-lights\/","title":{"rendered":"Newcomers, yearly participants shine in Parade of Lights"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><!-- gallery:96f54c6f-a3b9-4cb6-954c-7e92e23ead4b --><\/p>\n<figure class=\"wp-block-embed is-type-video wp-block-embed-youtube naviga-video-embed\">\n<div class=\"wp-block-embed__wrapper\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/KnsDqYzhGOI\" frameborder=\"0\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\" allowfullscreen><\/iframe><\/div>\n<\/figure>\n<p>The 28th annual Four Corners Board of Realtors Parade of Lights came on a warm Saturday night with a full moon overhead.<\/p>\n<p>Large crowds started to line Main Street an hour before the parade began at 6 p.m., and the street stayed busy after the hourlong event was done. More than 70 local businesses and nonprofits entered floats in the parade, about 20 more than in 2016. Many of them, including grand marshal Osprey Packs, had never participated before.<\/p>\n<p>Joel Rouse, of Osprey Packs, said the company decided to join the parade just two weeks in advance.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith the new building in town and everything, right in the middle of town, we\u2019re trying to do more \u2026 community involvement,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Several employees, including the company\u2019s owners and an Osprey mascot, walked alongside the float wearing Osprey backpacks and handing out coupons for their products.<\/p>\n<p>Some of the parade\u2019s most elaborate floats belonged to longtime participants, like Stormy\u2019s ATC Gymnastics, which featured several students in snowman costumes throwing foam snowballs at the crowd, and the Montezuma County Future Farmers of America, which had a float with a miniature cabin and hill with a moving sled. Stormy\u2019s won second place in 2016 for the \u201cCommercial\u201d category, and the FFA won first place in the \u201cOther\u201d category.<\/p>\n<p>The parade\u2019s theme was \u201cA Backcountry Christmas,\u201d so cabins and campfires were popular features on the floats.<\/p>\n<p>Volunteer Michelle Morris said she believed the larger turnout this year was partly due to the warm weather. The temperature was about 37 degrees at the end of the parade, according to the National Weather Service. Before the parade, Morris said she expected a huge turnout.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWith as warm as it is, I think there\u2019s going to be a lot,\u201d she said. \u201cI\u2019m not even wearing a coat.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>In addition to the many businesses that brought floats to the parade, several nonprofits used it as an opportunity to raise awareness of their causes. Cheri Valle, of For Pets\u2019 Sake Humane Society, rode her wheelchair alongside a vintage car, a few volunteers dressed in animal costumes and one actual dog named Peach, who was dressed in Christmas lights. It was the group\u2019s first year in the parade.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019ve been in this community for 34 years, a long time, but there are still people that aren\u2019t aware that they can call us and ask for help,\u201d Valle said. \u201cWe\u2019re always trying to get our name out there.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Another newcomer to the parade was the Dolores Playground Group, which supports the Ron Kotarski Memorial Playground in Joe Rowell Park. Its float featured real pine trees and a large model of the playground.<\/p>\n<p>Judges for this year\u2019s parade included Lily Jameson-Cash of KSJD Radio, Ryan Robison of the Sunflower Theatre and volunteer Swarvoski Little.<\/p>\n<p>Each of the parade winners received cash prizes from the Four Corners Board of Realtors.<\/p>\n<div class=\"naviga-element naviga-subheadline1\">The winners<\/div>\n<p><em class=\"mwc_body_bullet\">In the nonprofit category, Battle Rock Charter School won first place, the Girl Scouts Mesa Verde Service Unit won second, and the Dolores playground group won third.<\/em><em class=\"mwc_body_bullet\">In the commercial category, Stormy\u2019s ATC Gymnastics, LLP, won first place, followed by Shooter\u2019s World in second and Denise Dennison Farmers Insurance in third. <\/em><em class=\"mwc_body_bullet\">In the open class, miniature horse breeder Miniz \u2019N\u2019 More won first place, followed by Southwest Colorado Community College Welding Department and both Southwest Open School and the Cortez FFA in a tie for third place.<\/em><\/p>\n<div class=\"naviga-scoreboard\">\n<h4 class=\"scoreboard-title\">The Supermoon<\/h4>\n<p>The brightest light in Saturday\u2019s Parade of Lights was the full moon, which was unusually large and bright. It was the night before the first and only \u201csupermoon\u201d of 2017. According to<br>\n                Space.com<br>\n                , \u201csupermoons happen when a full moon approximately coincides with the moon\u2019s perigee, or a point in its orbit at which it is closest to Earth.\u201d This causes the moon to appear up to 30 percent brighter than normal, according to the site. This year\u2019s supermoon was at its most full when it rose after 5 p.m. on Sunday.<br>\n                The December moon is called the Full Cold Moon or the Long Nights Moon by several Native American tribes, according to the<br>\n                Farmer\u2019s Almanac<br>\n                .<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Corners Realtors parade fills Main Street with floats, crowd<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":75718,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[755,21,13,28,598,316],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-75716","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-christmas","tag-cortez","tag-frontpage-lead","tag-headlines","tag-public-holiday","tag-video"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75716","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=75716"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/75716\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/75718"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=75716"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=75716"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=75716"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=75716"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}