Balloon Glo

Fairly often we will see hot air balloons up in the air around here. Who wouldn't want to fly around here when you have gorgeous vistas of the Rocky Mountains? MED and MAD are absolutely enthralled every time they see the balloons up in the air, which is usually around 7 in the morning as we are driving to school. This year, it's just MAD seeing the balloons, but the excitement is still there.
Every year, Colorado Springs hosts a hot air balloon festival Labor Day weekend. Each morning of the long weekend, a bunch of hot air balloons take flight from Memorial Park at 7 a.m. A little too early for us. Saturday and Sunday evenings, however, they have a balloon glo. (No, I'm not spelling it wrong - this is how they spell it). We decided to go (along with tens of thousands of other people) last night to see what this was all about. As we arrived, the balloons were spread out on the ground and around 7:45, they began to inflate them - with big fans! About 8:00, the fuel was light and all the balloons began to go up. There was a wide variety of designs - from the Energizer Bunny to an American flag to colorful squares to a pig that can fly. It was amazing to be so close to all the balloons, seeing the size of the basket, how they turn on the 'fire' to fill up the balloon, and the sheer magnitude of the balloons themselves. About every couple of minutes, all of the balloons would 'glow' together. Here are some photos of what we were able to see last night:

Couldn't resist putting in pictures of the kids as they anxiously await the balloons' inflation

This was the first balloon to go up and be lit; pretty, isn't it?