Light up Lakewood is an annual event that has been going on for the past 13 years with each year better than the last.  There will always be food trucks and the parade but every year is unique in its own way.  Taking a look back at this year’s light-up Lakewood it featured fireworks, different musical groups, food trucks and of course the parade.

During Light up Lakewood, it is a time to go out with friends or family members and just have fun whether you want to try all of the food trucks with delicious treats found in Lakewood or listen to the music or just talk with people from around the city there is something for everyone to do.

This past Light Up Lakewood featured many fun and exciting events.  One of the first events was that two Lakewood High School Juniors Savannah Monroy and Mohamed Manaa were recognized for their great community service and were each given a $500 scholarship for being  Royalty Honorees.  Before the parade, there was the crowning of the winners of the Why I Love Lakewood essay contest which featured Zenovia Parkanzky who is a fourth-grader with stunning writing abilities.

The annual parade also featured the Grinch, Santa, and Buddy The Elf so the kids would behave since Santa is watching them.  Those two might have been the main attraction at the parade but there were different groups such as Lakewood’s sports teams (youth and high school), music groups, dance groups, charities, and even huskies.

After the parade featured many different things as you walked around the city including Ice carvings, food trucks, games for kids, live music, and even a holiday market.  While all this is fun that was not all that happened throughout the night.  There were fireworks later in the night shooting up over downtown Lakewood.

Each year Light up Lakewood gets bigger and better drawing more and more people in and it is estimated that this year over 20,000 people attended the event.  So if you didn’t get a chance to go this year there will always be next year since this amazing is one of Lakewood’s great traditions that will never go away.