Floats light up Clovis' Main Street

CLOVIS — On a warm December night that could have passed for spring weather, the annual Clovis Christmas Lights Parade helped kickoff the holiday season on Saturday.

Put on by Clovis MainStreet, the parade featured over 80 light-covered floats, up from about 55 in past years, which made their way down Main Street.

"I'm just shocked and blessed by the turnout we had for the parade, both in the number of businesses and organizations that participated and the patrons and community members who attended," Clovis MainStreet Executive Director Lisa Pellegrino-Spear said. "I am very grateful for everybody that participated and all of our volunteers."

The theme this year was Clovis Christmas Express in order to celebrate the city's historic railroad, and many groups embraced the theme with floats designed to look like train engines.

A number of people attended the parade for the first time this year.

"We enjoyed it," Amber Espinoza said. "The floats were good. I'm from Colorado and our floats aren't even this good, so it was nice to see that they really put a good effort into it."

Lilli and Asher Espinoza, ages 4 and 8, said getting candy was their favorite part of the parade.

Paul, Annette and Madeleine Fazenbaker were in town from Alamogordo to visit family and took the chance to see the parade.

They enjoyed seeing a larger scale parade than what they are used to at home and especially appreciated the large digital projection on the front of the Curry County Courthouse which displayed the parade logo and falling snow.

"We have a lighted parade in Alamogordo but we don't have any big buildings to put anything on," Annette said.

The Nichols family made a much shorter trip up from Portales to see the parade for the first time.

Charlien, age 5, and Leland, age 10, enjoyed the reading of "The Polar Express" conducted by Santa and Mrs. Claus at the Clovis-Carver Public Library earlier in the day and the family decided to stick around for the parade.

"I liked when (Mrs. Claus) said, 'All aboard,'" Charlien said.

In addition to the book reading, Santa and Mrs. Claus — played by Rick and Chickie Hinderlite — were at the railroad park in the afternoon taking pictures with over 200 children.

"Both of those events exceeded our expectations on attendance, and the parade itself we just couldn't have asked for better weather," Pellegrino-Spear said.

She said they will continue to put on the additional events in the future and will look to expand on them for next year.

In addition to the first-timers, many parade regulars were in attendance as well.

"We love Christmas, we love supporting Clovis and it's tradition, I guess, always got to come out and see the light parade," Victor Sanchez said.

Assistant City Clerk Vicki Reyes, Clovis-Carver Public Library Head Librarian Margaret Hinchee and Vincent Soule from the Young Professionals of Clovis served as judges for the parade.

Winners will be announced Monday morning and trophies will be awarded at the city commission meeting Thursday night.