Our family recently had the super fun opportunity to be in a local, promotional video! It is for Link Transit, our public transit company.
How does this relate to costuming? Well, let me tell you…Getting five small children dressed in their cutest winter attire, complete with coats, hats, and boots, is definitely a theatrical production! Up to this point, our kids hadn’t rode the Link Bus except during “Touch-A-Truck”. This is a fantastic event put on by the Women’s Service League of North Central Washington. All sorts of vehicles assemble in a giant parking lot, and kids can touch them, and even climb inside! There are fire trucks, police cars, a S.W.A.T. tank, helicopters taking off, and so much more. I hope your community offers something similar, because the event is pretty much heaven for little kids!
Here’s a photo of our family from “Touch-A-Truck”, back in 2013. I can hardly believe how little Emma (4) and Elliott (3) are in these photos! I had just had Oliver, a month prior, and Eliza was 16 months. During this same time, Jeff was Bert in Music Theatre of Wenatchee’s production of Mary Poppins. (Hence the significance of the banner on the bus.)
Alrighty, back to the present! Some awesome friends we know through our theatre connections gave us this opportunity, and our kids were sooo excited to ride the “Rainbow Bus”, as they call it. So, I went through all of our closets and dressed the kiddos in all the Hanna Andersson clothing items and vintage coats and hats they could stand, and we toodled on down to the bus station. (Can you tell how excited they are by their classic “scrunchy faces”?)
The bus was decked with garlands, ribbons, and ornaments. It was pretty magical! The kids couldn’t wait to climb aboard. (Don’t worry. I re-tied Emma’s boot lace.)
“There aren’t any seat belts?!?!?” The kids were both thrilled and perplexed by the lack of restraints during the ride!
Piped in Christmas music added to the festive mood. Okay, I have to stop for a moment and acknowledge this gorgeous, red, wool vintage coat I found for Annika. Five dollars at Goodwill, people! Five. Dollars.
Oh, and this Hanna Andersson dress that Emma wore, that I also found at Goodwill for five dollars. These sweater dresses retail for at least sixty dollars. And, they’re Swedish. And they’re gorgeous. So, yeah. I couldn’t grab it fast enough!
Okay, now we can go on. Sorry, I just get sooo excited about great finds!
Once we were settled, we were handed prop presents. I was sure that Oliver wouldn’t be able to control himself and would rip one open…But he managed to leave the packages intact…With lots of little reminders! The kids just loved viewing familiar streets from the higher perspective and large windows that the bus afforded them.
After a bit, we were dropped off at a bus stop, so that the camera guys could get video of us both exiting and boarding the bus.
Since we had by far the most kiddos, they had us get off at the first stop so that we would also be the first group to be picked back up.
They couldn’t have picked a better day to film! It was crisp, outside, but also gorgeous and sunny!
Santa himself boarded the bus for the last leg of our trip! He and his elves gave the kids candy canes and Christmas ornaments.
Back at the station, the Link Transit crew served us a delicious pizza lunch, and the kids enjoyed some coloring. All in all, it was an amazing, memorable morning! Once again, I have fallen even more in love with my community. Oh, and the actual holiday video? You can view it here!
I hope I’ll be able to make a few more posts before Christmas, but just in case…All of us at the Heminger House wish all of you a merry, blessed Christmas!
