Balloon Fest!

Recently was Midland's hot air balloon festival. This is a festival that takes Midland by storm each September and brings in hundreds of "balloonists" to the area. On Friday night they have what they call "the glow". It's when some of the ballonists unpack their balloons and air them up at night. They don't fly anywhere, but they just fire off their flames to fill up their balloons. Because it's dark out, the flame makes the balloon glow and makes for an incredible evening. On Saturday and Sunday the balloonists compete in several competitions. One that I know of is where each balloon flys around the greater Mid-Michigan area and drops beanbags at large targets painted in designated fields. Unfortunately the weather was too foggy this year and so they didn't take off on Saturday. Sandy did get pictures of one balloon that did get unpacked to give short up-and-down rides to children. The balloonists did get to compete on Sunday however!


The balloon festival makes driving a car just a bit more interesting and definitely more challenging than usual that weekend. Besides the average Joe who is looking up at dozens of balloons and watching them hover gracefully in the sky, each balloon has a spotter team who's job is to follow the balloon from the ground in case there is trouble.(so you know they're not watching the road either) Being in a car is definitely taking your life into your own hands. As if Michigan drivers needed an excuse to drive poorly!


I attached a few of the pictures that Sandy took this year. Somewhere I have pictures from last year's festival as well. If I find those I will be sure to post them. Many of the same balloons show up from year to year and it's a great time to see what fun designs will be floating around. One balloon was in the shape of a house while many others take the shape of popular cartoon animals. If you've ever been curious what the Macy's Thanksgiving parade would look like if the balloons were to get free, this event would give you a pretty good picture of that might look like :)


The past few weeks have been busy ones, but good. My classes are in full swing and a lot of my time has been devoted to that. We had the opportunity to spend an evening playing games and eating snacks with some of our neighbors last weekend. They are a "couple", of people who share an apartment together. They are both handicapped so they usually don't get out much. They are a riot together, but neither are walking with our Father. They both have religious pasts, but neither go to church now. Tony continues to express interest in what it is we believe and how that differs from what he has been taught from his Catholic childhood. He's a great guy, but doesn't have the joy of a Saviour in his life. Please be praying as Sandra and I find openings to talk about Spiritual matters with him.


We've also been crazy busy with our church and are serving as part of a Timothy team. A Timothy team is a team of people who come together and support a couple or family that is preparing to go the mission field. Every person that is sent by our church has a Timothy team in place. We're not for sure what our specific roles are going to be yet, but we are excited to send out an awesome family overseas and to see what this process looks like. We want to know what it looks like to be sent well by the body so we can continue in this work and that we will know what we may need if Father leads us in that direction!