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By TYLER RALEY | Special to the Reporter

HELENA – The people and visitors of Helena all came together to celebrate and bask in the joy of the holiday season with the running of the city’s annual Christmas parade on Saturday, Dec. 7.

With the festivities being held on the afternoon following the city’s annual Christmas tree lighting, emotions were buzzing as all of the holiday’s excitement filled the town while people marched through Old Town, spreading cheer to all who lined the streets.

The parade has always been an event to look forward to with each holiday season that comes around, and its following continues to widen with it, as well.

“Our parade is always wonderful, and it has grown throughout the years,” said Joy Childers, board member of the Helena Beautification Board. “Now, thousands of people line the streets, all the way from up around McDonald’s all the way down to where we turn the parade at Old Town. It just keeps getting bigger and bigger.”

The highlight of this year’s festivities was the theme of the entire parade, which was centered around the Grinch. With many people dressed up as the characters of the holiday classic like the Grinch himself and even Cindy Lou Who, everybody involved seemed to embrace the theme.

Helena City Councilmember Alice Lobell was involved in the parade, and as she reflects on all that happened on that Saturday afternoon, she feels joyful knowing how much this event brings the city together.

“I laugh and say that half of Helena is watching the parade and the other half is in the parade because it’s very oriented toward the school groups, church groups, boys scouts and girl scouts,” Lobell said. “I think it’s just a really good positive thing for Helena. I think it still shows it still has a very small town feel to it. Personally, I really like that, even though we’re not so small town anymore.”

Each year, the parade presents many creative and outstanding floats related to the theme. This year was no different, with Grinched-themed floats stealing the show all throughout the route. A crowd favorite involved the city’s Harley club, which featured citizens driving Harley-Davidson motorcycles decked out as reindeer, helping to pull Santa’s sleigh.

Many were eye-opening, which really gave Childers a sense of pride with the response this parade brought, seeing all of the smiles from the people who came out to watch.

“All of the floats were so creative and you couldn’t have a better theme than the Grinch, so the kids were really into it,” Childers said. “The kids were so enthusiastic about it and they really took on the role of the characters in the Grinch trying to steal the Christmas tree and the kids pulling him away. It was a fun theme. It’s probably one of my favorite themes of all the themes that we’ve had.”

The parade has proven to be highly successful over its recent history. With this year being no different residents can look forward to more iterations of this Helena tradition in years to come.

As the parade went on, that is all Childers could think about, knowing this is not only a great time of year for herself, but for the entire city of Helena as well.

“I could not do this without my committee,”  Childers said. “Once the parade starts, it takes on a life of its own, and there’s nothing you can do but hold on and smile and enjoy and just relish in the fact that the community comes out and supports. To me, that’s the best part of the parade, is seeing people come out and smile and seeing neighbors and people that they haven’t seen in a long time, lots of hugs. It’s a great day.”