Day Of The Dead Festival & Frida Kahlo Look-Alike Contest

I was so happy to hear that the Brooks Museum was hosting a Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) parade & festival. I knew that it would make for a great way to kick off the season! Even more exciting was that they were going to have a Frida Kahlo look-alike contest. So yeah another fun fact, I'm pretty competitive. I was already planning on doing a Frida costume for the blog so I thought I might as well join in on the fun!

For those of you that are not familiar with Day of the Dead, it follows Halloween. It's a time where families are able to celebrate the deceased instead of mourning. Families and friends get together to create a shrine or space for their departed to come back to the world of the living. Celebrating the things they enjoyed in life. It's honored throughout Mexico and some places in the U.S. 

The Brooks Museum is nestled in Overton park which is a beautiful park and golf course in the middle of midtown, Memphis. The Memphis Zoo and Memphis College of Art (where I graduated from) also call Overton Park home. So, it made for a great backdrop to take my Frida pictures that I shared in the previous post.

The festival was out front and inside the Brooks Museum. They had performers, food trucks, and traditional Mexican fruit cups and drinks outside. Inside they had different stations like making Frida flower crowns, painting butterfly masks, and painting rocks like sugar skulls to spread around town allowing for everyone to explore different parts of the museum for free.

Scroll down to see images of the fest and to see the winners of the Frida contest!

That's right y'all I won first place for my age group! I'm glad it was broken down by age because some of those little Frida Kahlos were so good! There were so many women in my age group that entered, they ended up having a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd category. After the judges announced 3rd & 2nd. I was starting to get a little nervous. When it was time to call the 1st place winner, the judge walked down the line passing me up but then backed up and pulled me out of line from the remaining ladies. I was so happy! I felt like I just won a pageant or something. Haha. It was pretty special! I also think that Diego, my monkey definitely was the icing on the cake. My lucky charm. He probably was the reason I won because there was some good competition! Plus I was rocking a fierce brow! The Brooks Museum gave the winners a membership for 2! It includes exhibits and access to night events they throw among a few other cool perks. 

It was a lot of fun! After the festival, I changed out of my Frida clothes so that Randall and I could go meet up with my sister and her boyfriend to celebrate my win at Molly's La Casita Mexican restaurant. 

I hope everyone enjoyed seeing and hearing about my fun-filled day!

Love. Mucho Mucho.