Pat Smart of Cape Girardeau helps build floats for the annual Rose Parade

For Pat Smart, winter doesn't settle down after the excitement of the holidays. Just two days after Christmas, she flies to California to help build floats for the Rose Parade in Pasadena, Calif.

"You just go up to a float and ask if they need any help, and they'll say 'Yes, get on up here,'" she says. "There's really so much to do. You can tell just by looking at it."

She describes huge tents sheltering the floats while hundreds of people busily turn the metal frameworks into floral masterpieces. Fresh flowers take up two or three football fields' worth of space, all waiting to be perfectly cut and arranged -- and that's only for a couple of floats, says Smart.

"It really is lots of fun," she says. "You meet people from all over the world. It's very fun, very enjoyable and very rewarding to take that bucket of flowers and turn it into something."

Smart volunteered as a float maker for the first time in 1987, and this will be her eighth return. She has family in that part of California, and when her brother told her about friends who volunteered as float makers, Smart thought she'd like to give it a try. At the time, she lived in Maryland and ran her own floral shop, so she already knew working with flowers was something she could do well. She continued working as a florist after moving to Cape Girardeau and currently works at Knaup Floral Inc.

"The first time I worked on a parade, I asked (the coordinator) after working a day or so, 'Does it make any difference having me here, as a floral designer by trade?' She said, 'Oh yes, it does!' She had me doing quite a few things that were very delicate. She trusted me more than anybody else," Smart says.

Smart says the most interesting part of building a float is working with the dried seeds that are used on the areas without flowers. Volunteers paint the area first, then dip their hands in the seeds and place them on the float. The seeds come in all sorts of sizes, colors and textures.

"It's so fascinating to see that materialize, and it all has to be done before starting with any of the flowers," she says.

The night before the parade, volunteers stay up all night to put the finishing touches on the floats, mainly the fresh roses, orchids and other delicate flowers that can't be placed ahead of time.

"Each float is covered with many kinds of flowers. Everything on the float has to be a living plant at one time. The seeds are an exception. Everything else is fresh flowers," says Smart. "We wait until the last night to put the most delicate things on ... It takes shape and it's so pretty when it gets done, and very fragrant. It's really lots of fun."

When volunteers finish a float, most will check with other groups to see if they can use some extra help.

"We all pitch in and help each other," says Smart. "When (a float) you were working on wins some prize, it's really important to all of us -- that they thought our float was pretty enough to win this prize. It's really, really rewarding."

It's especially neat, she says, to work behind the scenes and see all the hard work, various flowers and different designs that went into each float. In truth, the preparations begin long before Smart even arrives in December -- the theme for next year's parade is set before the current parade is over, she says, and they begin rebuilding their floats about a week after the parade.

"The judges know all this and see all this and they really pay attention to how much work goes into it," she says.

Smart has worked most years on either the Rand McNally or Kodak floats. When she finds a good float coordinator, she likes to work with them year after year, and many volunteers do the same.

"We're working side by side quite often. When we take a break we get to meet each other, and each day usually the same people come back to the same float," says Smart. "You really form a friendship, and that means a lot after awhile."

Smart believes the success of a float depends on "a good person in charge who really keeps you hopping." Most of the coordinators have big manuals where they've outlined, hour by hour, exactly what needs to be done to finish the float.

"It looks like a big bunch of metal welded together, and you think, 'This doesn't look like anything,' but then it does," says Smart. "It's just so rewarding, really, to be able to work with them and see it all take shape and see it go down the street on New Year's Day."