NEW ORLEANS (AP) \u2014 You just can\u2019t keep a good city down, especially when Mardi Gras is coming.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
All around New Orleans, thousands of houses are being decorated as floats because the coronavirus outbreak canceled the elaborate parades mobbed by crowds during the Carnival season leading to Fat Tuesday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Some smaller groups announced no-parade plans\u00a0before\u00a0the city did. Pandemic replacements include scavenger hunts for signature trinkets that normally would be thrown from floats or handed out from a\u00a0streetcar,\u00a0as well as outdoor art and\u00a0drive-thru\u00a0or virtual parades. The prominent\u00a0Krewe of Bacchus\u00a0has an app where people can catch and trade virtual trinkets during Carnival and watch a virtual parade Feb. 14, when the parade had been scheduled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the \u201chouse float\u201d movement started almost as soon as a New Orleans spokesman\u00a0announced\u00a0Nov. 17 that parades were off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
That morning, Megan Joy Boudreaux posted what she later called a silly\u00a0Twitter joke:\u00a0\u201cWe\u2019re doing this. Turn your house into a float and throw all the beads from your attic at your neighbors walking by.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
But the more she thought about it, the more she liked it. She started a Facebook group, the\u00a0Krewe of House Floats,\u00a0expecting a few friends and neighbors to join. The numbers rose. Thirty-nine subgroups evolved to discuss neighborhood plans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
By Carnival season\u2019s official start Jan. 6, the group had more than 9,000 members, including out-of-state \u201cexpats.\u201d About 3,000, including a few as far afield as England and Australia, will have their houses on an official online map, said Charlotte \u201cCharlie\u201d Jallans-Daly, one of two mapmakers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Houses are to be decorated at least two weeks before Fat Tuesday, which is Feb. 16 this year. With widespread addresses and two weeks to gawk, the hope is that people will spread out widely in time and space.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI didn\u2019t think I was starting a Mardi Gras krewe. Here I am,\u201d Boudreaux said. \u201cI\u2019ve got myself a second full-time job.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Discussions in the Facebook groups include how-tos, ads for props and neighborhood themes. Artists have given livestreamed outdoor lessons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Katie Bankens posted that her block\u2019s theme was Shark Week staycation paradise. When a resident worried that she was not \u201ccrafty\u201d enough, administrator Carley Sercovich replied that if they could play music and throw trinkets to neighbors, \u201cyou are perfect for this Krewe!\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Boudreaux also suggested that people could hire or buy from out-of-work Carnival artists and suppliers hit by the parade cancellation. A spreadsheet of artists and vendors followed. One of them, artist Dominic \u201cDom\u201d Graves, booked more than 20 five-person classes in professional papier mache techniques, at $100 a person.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Devin DeWulf, who already had started two pandemic charities as head of the\u00a0Krewe of Red Beans\u00a0walking club, kicked the house float idea up a few notches at the suggestion of\u00a0Caroline Thomas, a professional float designer. Their\u00a0\u201cHire a Mardi Gras Artist\u201d\u00a0crowdfunded lotteries collected enough money to put crews to work decorating 11 houses, plus commissioned work at two more houses and seven businesses.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cWe\u2019ve put about 40 people to work, which is nice,\u201d DeWulf said. With Mardi Gras approaching, he said a 12th lottery would be the last.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
One commissioned house is rented by a pair of nuns.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Sisters Mary Ann Specha and Julie Walsh, who run a shelter for homeless women with children, had to get permission for their own crowdfunding from the motherhouse of the Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Dubuque, Iowa. \u201cThey loved it,\u201d Specha said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The crowdfunded decorations may be auctioned after Mardi Gras to raise more money, DeWulf said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Several mansions along a short stretch of St. Charles Avenue had elaborate displays with signs noting their creation by one of the city\u2019s biggest float-making studios.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Tom Fox, whose wife, Madeline, painted a Spongebob Squarepants scene and made jellyfish from dollar store bowls, said he thinks a new tradition may have begun.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cEven when Mardi Gras comes back, I think people are going to keep doing this,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
NEW ORLEANS (AP) \u2014 You just can\u2019t keep a good city down […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":215,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-214","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=214"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":216,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/214\/revisions\/216"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=214"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=214"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.viewworld.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=214"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}