By Paige Gurgainers
If you weren’t in downtown Minden this past weekend, you missed out on a spectacular 3-day, action-packed Christmas in Minden event. Multiple agencies, including the Greater Minden Chamber, Webster Parish Tourism, Minden Main Street, Webster Parish Libraries, Dorcheat Museum and dozens of other businesses, worked together to ensure that there was something for everyone to enjoy.
The event kicked off on Friday with the Christmas tree lighting ceremony in front of the Minden Civic Center, followed by a well-attended 2nd annual Wine Walk sponsored by the Minden Foundation and Minden Family Dental.
Walkers were able to shop storefronts and vendors all along the brick street while enjoying fellowship, food and free musical entertainment provided by Justin Armstrong and Will Colvin.
For those that wanted to rest their feet and learn more about historic downtown, the Webster Parish Tourism and Dorcheat Museum held a ‘Holiday Trail of Lights’ Hayride that included tons of interesting information, Christmas lights and caroling.
“This is the fourth year for the hayride, and we saw by far the largest number of riders this year,” said museum director Jessica Gorman. “Based on the number of children, moving the fireworks and children’s area to Friday night seems to have been a major factor. The hayride was scheduled for 6:00-9:00 but instead ran until 9:45.”
Due to the imminent threat of rain, the firework show was bumped up to Friday evening, which served as the perfect ending to the first night of festivities.
Things kicked off bright and early on Saturday with a Christmas Brunch hosted by Geaux Fresh, followed by hot chocolate, photos with Santa and the ‘Presents on Pearl’ vendor market.
Rain moved out just in time for the ‘Candyland Christmas’ parade. Although they were all pretty sweet, the Greater Minden Chamber announced the parade winners early Monday morning with the best marching group going to Louisiana LunaChicks. Santa’s award went to Minden Family Medicine Clinic and the Spectacular Sparkles award was given to the St. Jude Kid’s Float.
The weekend wrapped up on Sunday with the Christmas Tour of Homes that took place from 1 to 6 p.m. Many guests were able to tour seven stunning properties elegantly decorated for the season including the Baird-Sanders house, the Dorcheat Museum, Estate Les Chenes, the Fuller House, Huffman Manor, the Scheerer House and the Stewart Center.
