Photos by SAM DEAN The Roanoke Times

Children gather to speak with Santa, who was on the final float in Saturday's Grandin Village Holiday Children's Parade.

Photo by Sam Dean | The Roanoke Times

People line the parade route on Grandin Road on Saturday.

Photo by Sam Dean | The Roanoke Times

Watching the Grandin Village Holiday Children's Parade from the warmth of Too Many Books, Audrey Opperman, 9, laughs at the hat worn by a parade participant.

Parade veterans young and old bundled up Saturday morning for the do-it-yourself charm of the annual Grandin Village Holiday Children's Parade.

Matt Hannah, 12, was all business as he described his changing role amid the Woodrow Wilson Middle School marchers. Last year as a sixth-grader, he marched behind the band, retrieving dropped mouthpieces and other gear inadvertently left along the Grandin Road parade route. This year, however, Matt was in the band, playing a trombone through the chilly morning air.

"It takes a lot of work," he said of the band's preparation for the several parades and basketball games where it performs each year.

But much of what was on display Saturday had a considerably less-rehearsed feel.

Part of the joy of the Grandin event is that almost anyone who shows up can march. With motorized transport strictly limited -- firetrucks, a few antique cars and the wacky squadron of Shriners vehicles were about all that were allowed in -- the parade remains at a child's scale, with marching bands, costumed dogs and dozens of wagons made into floats.

So there was Curious George leading Christmas carols, the mouse from the "If You Give a Mouse a Cookie" book, a yellow-hatted squad dressed like Madeline and her classmates, a bagpiper playing "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" and, of course, Santa waving from atop Roanoke Fire-EMS Ladder Truck 7.

And there were pounds and pounds and pounds of candy flung to children darting among the throngs of onlookers.

Christmas was definitely the best-represented festivity in the holiday parade, but there were hints of other observances as well, with the thrown candy reprising Halloween along with scattered reminders of Thanksgiving's approach.

Henry Ward, 5, was among about 60 children and parents from Raleigh Court Presbyterian Church's preschool, many of whom wore something suggesting an American Indian theme. Henry had a fringed tunic emblazoned with his nickname, "Chief Talkalot," as he and his mom, Laurie Powell-Ward, a teacher at the preschool, marched down the street. The chief's favorite part of the morning? "Riding in Ethan's wagon," he said.

Near the front of the procession amid the Shriners clown brigade, as usual, was Joe Parrish, costumed in a red fright wig and yellow jumpsuit as his alter ego "Jo Jo the Klown" -- "we don't know how to spell," he said. Parrish figured he had participated in at least 20 Grandin parades.

He'd donned one of his clown outfits, including the one he wore Saturday, which some children mistook for Ronald McDonald, for about five parades this year, as well as the annual Shriners circus. It was a schedule he'd kept for decades, he said.

Somewhat less experienced but still with a parade record beyond what an onlooker might have expected were a trio of young marchers wearing the horned helmets of the Sons of Norway/Local Colors contingent.

Before Saturday, "I marched in a parade as a snowflake," offered Harrison Brock, 8.

"I was an Indian," said Davis Lee, 9.

But for the Grandin parade, Harrison, Davis and their friend Austin Zappia, 8, were Christmas Vikings brandishing mock weapons and flinging candy as they rode a dragon-headed longboat-on-wheels. It was an experience they said they thoroughly enjoyed.

"Snowflakes don't get a sword," Harrison said.

Kelly List Zappia, Austin's mother, revealed a secret of the parade candy throwers as the boys grinned and patted their pockets.

"They pick the best stuff out," she said.