Roscrea's St. Patrick's Day celebrations seemed to get started around Wednesday last week, with the local businesses throwing themselves into the spirit of the whole thing by throwing up bunting, flags and local cultural memorabilia into the window displays. The prize for the best window display was awarded on Saturday, where Percival's won top prize for their shop window display.
Expressions had their window decorated well for the weekend that was in it, but was only really seen in all its glory once the sun had set and the evening festivities had commenced.
The Expressions family were ready to hit the parade at 3pm and arrived full of excitement to a ghost town...
So apparently it started at 3:30 which just serves as a perfect reminder to read the flyers and the posters around the town. So we opened up the surgery and used it as a base for getting the kids dressed up into hats, gloves and scarves. Met Eireann was kind to us and there seemed to be about a 90 minute window of dry weather this weekend that we could just about squeeze a parade in to. The expressions coffee machine was in full flow, getting us all ready to head out into the cold, and at 3:30 we ventured out to see what the Roscrea community were able to put together and who would take the crown this year as best overall parade entry, to take the cup from 'The Singing Dog' from last years parade.
Spot them if you can, the deserved winners this year were Corville National School, and their amazing float and costumes must have taken weeks of preparation. Congratulations to everyone involved, and well done to the organising committee who for sure brought a little sunshine to an otherwise wet and windy weekend.