Floral and Hardy Volunteers : Rose Float Workers Say It Can Be Difficult, Tiring and Messy but Is Still a Labor of Love

Standing beside a smiling cartoon car covered with a rainbow of flowers, Nan Reger said there was no place she would rather be during the final days before the Rose Parade than working on a float.

Reger, wearing blue jeans splotched with dried glue and paint, surveyed the Disneyland float she was working on and said there’s nothing like the adrenaline rush that comes with the last-minute, all-night frenzy to put the final floral touches in place.

“I just find it extremely exciting to work on all the little details that people have no idea about when they see it on TV,” Reger said.

Reger, 53, of Fullerton, was one of hundreds of volunteer float decorators working inside a cool, fragrant tent as big as a football field in Pasadena on Wednesday. As she has for the last six holiday seasons, she is spending the entire week before the parade putting vividly colored flower petals, leaves and seeds into place.

“Rose Parade decorating just gets into your veins and you just have to come be a part of it. No one can appreciate that until they’ve done it,” she said.

The Disneyland float, “Car Toon Spin,” which was inspired by the movie “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?,” has Benny the Cab careening down a Toon Town street. In the parade, actors dressed as cartoon characters Mickey Mouse and Roger Rabbit will ride aboard.

At the back of the float, standing amid cups of glue and boxes of freshly cut flowers, Karen Collier, 46, of Anaheim, directed the work of teen-agers in her church’s youth group.

Calling up to one teen-ager working 30 feet above on a scaffold, she shouted directions for the proper application of oats to a sticky surface: “You have to stick it on, or it won’t stay. Don’t throw it on!”

Later, during a break, she said that most people don’t realize the amount of work that goes into a float. Dozens of volunteers work in shifts from 9 a.m. to midnight for days to prepare a single float for its journey. And in the final hours before the parade, people work around the clock.

“It takes a lot of stamina. You really have to hang in there,” she said. Still, when all the work is done, workers enjoy “the satisfaction of seeing something so beautiful when it goes down Colorado Boulevard.”

For Stephanie Paul, 14, of Diamond Bar, the decorating is fun but not without some minor drawbacks. “You’ve got to be prepared to get messy. You get glued-on, you get seeds stuck on you.”

As she and her friends worked, visitors from all over the United States and abroad walked through the tent to glimpse behind the scenes the world’s best known parade.

“Wow, look at that!” exclaimed Nikki Cohen, as she stopped in front of the Disneyland float.

“It’s really amazing. It’s like an architectural feat,” said Cohen, 40, a visitor from Boulder, Colo. “I’ve been watching this parade on TV for 25 years, and at least now I know what it really looks like.”

Aside from Disneyland, Orange County participants this year include Marines in a marching band composed of musicians from bases throughout Southern California. On Wednesday, the 118-member West Coast Composite Marine Band spent the afternoon practicing for the march down Orange Grove and Colorado boulevards.

“With all the hustle and bustle and the TV cameras, it’s a very exciting time, and it’s a very humbling experience,” said Gunnery Sgt. Leon Joyce Jr., who will lead the band on New Year’s Day.

Joyce, 35, of Tustin, marched in the parade in 1978, but said this will be his first time as drum major.

“I’m a little fearful of it because I know the stature of the parade,” he said after rehearsal Wednesday.

“I might lose a little sleep, but I’m definitely eager to do it,” he said. “The Rose Parade is the granddaddy of all parades.”