Mardi Gras World

We got into the Mardi Gras spirit in NOLA by visiting Blaine Kern's Mardi Gras World.  This is the company that makes the floats for Mardi Gras and various other high-profile parades.  We had to pay to take a tour of the factory / warehouse, but it was worth it (especially since I had a coupon).  Instead of paper tickets, they gave us a special string of mardi gras beads that served as our entrance passes.  The warehouse was huge and had many floats and decorations from past events stored in it.  I couldn't believe how much stuff was in the warehouse.  Even more amazing was that this was only one of eighteen warehouses owned by the company.  On our tour we learned how the floats are made and got to hear about how the parades are sponsored by different krewes.  We also got to see some of the employees working on floats for next years' event.  One really nice worker spotted Owen and Olivia and gave them beads and a toy football that were left over from this year's festivities.

 After the tour was over, we were allowed to wonder around the warehouse and have a closer look at all of the cool floats from years past.  Some of our favorites were Lumiere from Beauty and the Beast, a large panda, and the Wizard of Oz.  Olivia wanted see each and every inch of the warehouse.  Owen, on the other hand, was not quite as interested.  To pass the time while us girls did some exploring, Brian and Owen started tossing the toy football around in the warehouse.  Silly boys.

After the tour, we were each given a piece of King Cake- a pastry typically associated with Mardi Gras.  It was pretty good- but not as good as my sister Hannah's cakes =)  This is probably the closest that I will ever get to attending Mardi Gras, so I'm glad that it was a fun experience.