Fiesta traditions

Last year while covering the Battle of Flowers Fiesta parade I found a really sweet story about a family who carries on a tradition of renting a room at the downtown Travelodge to spend Fiesta weekend and watch the parades. The tradition was started by the family's matriarch 23 years ago and now several families are involved. Because of the way the paper covers the parade, this family's story didn't make it in the paper last year but I promised I would return with a reporter the following year. So that's what I did today, the day before the big parade.



A photograph of Elisa V. Jimenez celebrating her last Fiesta hangs on the wall of her family's room at the Travelodge as Jimenez's daughter, Teresa Trevino, left, Trevino's daughter, Andrea Villareal, and Villareal's 14-month-old daughter, Victoria Elisa Tayler Villareal, decorate their room at the hotel on Broadway for Fiesta weekend in San Antonio on Thursday, April 26, 2007. Before she passed away six years ago, Elisa V. Jimenez made the family promise to continue the now 23-year tradition and get the same room every year to spend the weekend watching the parades.