Pets on parade in Faribault ? Minnesota Prairie Roots

Taco the dog, photographed earlier this summer on a Saturday morning at the Faribault Farmers? Market in Central Park.

PETS AND KIDS equal cuteness, wouldn?t you agree?

Thursday evening the cuteness combination commands several city streets during my community?s Pet Parade?the 76th annual according to information published by the Faribault Parks & Recreation Department.

The kids and their animals will line up in categories like little dogs, big dogs, rabbits, kittens and cats, unusual pets, farm animals, and, at the tail end, horses, of course.

In between, there will be floats and kids in strollers and on bikes, trikes, scooters, skateboards and roller blades. There will be clowns and costumes and perhaps even chaos in this ?It?s a Zoo Around Here!? themed event.

I haven?t been to the Pet Parade in many years, mostly because my kids are all grown up and they were the reason I attended.

We never participated in the parade. Our only pets were goldfish. And I probably never told my three they could walk in the parade without a pet. Sometimes parents are smart like that and don?t share details. Just let the kids think that because they don?t own a cat or dog or snake or some other animal, they must simply watch.

I expect I never told them either about the free freeze pops and music in Central Park after the parade. I don?t know if treats are still part of the parade. But the parade still ends in Central Park. This year?s entertainment features zoo animal dances by girls ages 5 ? 9 who participated in a Spirit Team summer camp. More cuteness, for sure.

The Pet Parade mural installed on the Central Park band shell.

Central Park is also the site of an artistic tribute to Faribault?s long-running Pet Parade. In May the Mural Society of Faribault installed a Pet Parade mural on the park?s historic band shell, making it the seventh mural the group has placed in Faribault.

Lots of dogs on the left side of the mural?

The artwork definitely possesses that cuteness factor although I wish a few animals besides dogs were featured in the mural.

And what about that date, ?since 1939??

Lots of dogs and that 1939 date on the right side of the mural.

If that date is right, then the 2012 Pet Parade would not be the 76th, but the 73rd annual. Correct? I?m not really all that good at math. And, yes, my kids know that.

FYI: The Pet Parade begins at 7 p.m. on Thursday, August 9, at Ninth Street Northwest and Second Avenue Northwest, proceeds south on Second Avenue, turns west on Fifth Street and ends in Central Park.

? Copyright 2012 Audrey Kletscher Helbling

Source: http://mnprairieroots.wordpress.com/2012/08/08/pets-on-parade-in-faribault/

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