Smithsonians: Balloon Fiesta

I did it! I got up at 3:30 this morning to go to the balloon fiesta! I got dressed and gathered up a few things that I was unable to get last night. I woke up the kids one by one, oldest to youngest. I got them to the car with a pillow and blanket. They were easy to get down there, which was great. Christen warned me that they wouldn't fall back asleep, and they didn't. The thing I was the most nervous about was finding the place and figuring out where to park. I had read reviews that the parking lot was filled by 4:30 in the morning. Mike sent me step by step directions of how he would get there. They worked like a charm! We arrived around 4:00 in the morning. There were at least 100 other cars there, probably more. Mike texted me this morning and asked how things were going. I sent him this picture.

Skye, Blake & Parker, Larkin

My plan was to have the kids sleep in the car for awhile. They didn't want to do that. I did go and get my ticket while Skye watched the kids. I parked close to the ticket booth, so I wasn't worried. I had to pay $10. Kids 12 and under were free. How great is that! All the kids got in free. The gates opened at 4:30 in the morning. After the giant line died down a bit we headed in. Today was 'kids day' and we wandered around and found a kids table. The Trix rabbit was there! I talked the kids into getting a picture with the rabbit so I could send it to their parents. When we were doing that this lady came and gave each of them a bag full of stuff. I was excited because I packed a whole bunch of snacks that Larkin and Blake could eat, but I forgot a backpack. Now I had a bag to put them in!

Skye and the Trix rabbit

Parker, Larkin, Blake, Skye, Trix bunny

As soon as the rabbit left a news crew came and asked if they could interview the kids. Larkin, Blake and Parker quickly backed up. Skye was left alone. She was interviewed by Chanel 4 I think. They asked her if she had ever been to kids day before. She hadn't. They had her go through the bag to get her reaction. They asked if she had a favorite balloon. It is the pig. They asked other questions too. She did great!

Skye being interviewed

We went and sat at a picnic table and Parker took the opportunity to eat the Cinnamon Toast Crunch that was in the bag. There was also milk, a spoon, cookies, a pinwheel, a sticker book, and coupons. There might have been more stuff. Good thing they didn't interview Blake. He would be, "Allergic to this, allergic to this, allergic to this." After Parker ate we decided to head back to the car and get an extra jacket. We got turned around and went out the wrong exit. It was a long walk to the car! We got in for a bit and I read them a little of The Thing About Georgie. I then filled up a bag with allergy free food. That was so nice to have!

Blake, Parker, Skye, Larkin

We got back inside in time to watch the Night Patrol. It was so fun to watch these balloons light up and fly away. I let each of the kids pick out one souvenir. Blake and Parker picked swords that light up. Larkin picked a stuffed hamster and Skye picked a green and black ballish kind of thing.

Night patrol

Blake, Skye, Larkin, Parker

We found a great spot to sit and relax while we watched balloons fill up. It was so cool! We could walk around all of these balloons and even touch them as they were blowing up. It was so beautiful watching hundreds and hundreds of balloons flying right over our heads. I wish my family could have been there!

Blake & Larkin

The sunrise was pretty too!

Skye & Larkin, Parker & Blake

This lady was so proud of her photobomb. I have to admit it was excellent.

My attempt at time-lapse.

We watched the Lindstrand balloon blow up. I had no idea what Lindstrand was. I had never heard of that brand. Later I discovered the Lindstrand booth. They make the baskets for the hot air balloons.

Blake and Parker touched this balloon as it was blowing up.

Parker and Blake

Stephanie ~ my attempt at a selfie. That never ends well.

Spider balloon

I like that carousel balloon.

The emoji balloon is the one Blake and Parker touched while it was blowing up. (And me, because I had to!)

Parker, Skye, Larkin, Blake

Stork and sad clown. These balloons are awesome!

I tried to send some pictures to Jorja. When I sent them my phone froze. I turned it off and tried to turn it back on. It wouldn't come on. It said the battery was dead. I thought I had 28% left. I wish I would have FaceTimed Jorja instead. That would have been so much fun! I was super disappointed about that because there were so many cool balloons that we saw. The ones I have pictures of are just a small, small sample of what we actually saw. We were super close to Darth Vader and Yoda. They were so cool! There was also a Jesus balloon! I laughed so hard! We saw three different frogs too. We were so lucky with the weather. I only saw a small handful of balloons in the air yesterday. Today there were hundreds!

We started making our way to the parking lot. There was a kids area with a ton of blow up toys. Tickets were $9 a piece. Blake and Parker have been asking and asking to go to Chuck-E-Cheese. I told the kids they could either go on one of the rides or go to Chuck-E-Cheese tomorrow, but not both. Parker was the hardest one to convince. He really wanted to go to Chuck-E-Cheese. Finally the older kids convinced him. Skye and Larkin went in this drop blowup ride thing. They loved it. Especially Larkin. She wants that ride to be at her next birthday party. Blake was planning on going on the balls that float on water, but he decided to do the slides with Parker. There were four blow up things that the kids could play 20 minutes on. They spent the entire time on one slide. Blake went 39 times. When his time was up I asked if he ever went on any of the other ones. He said, "We could go on those?" Haha.

I decided to stop at the McDonalds drive thru on the way home. I had the kids figure out exactly what they wanted before I went through the line. When it was our turn they said they were only selling breakfast. Whoops! We had been up for hours and it was only breakfast time!

We just enjoyed the next several hours at home. Skye took a three hour nap. The rest of them stayed wide awake. I took Blake to baseball practice. I stayed and watched him. I was sitting in the stands when I thought I heard my name, which was really weird. Especially since I thought I heard Stephanie Millburn. About five minutes later two girls started talking to some people in front of me. They asked, "Do you know a Stephanie Millburn?" I yelled out that that was me. They had found my drivers license! What? How did I lose that? I was so thankful that they kept searching for me. How would I have gotten home? Guaranteed I would not think I lost my license at the baseball field. I would have been frantically searching Mike and Christen's house! Thank goodness that didn't happen!

Skye came home from soccer practice right as I was about to start reading to Larkin and Blake. I asked her if she could come upstairs before she ate. We read a couple more chapters of The Thing About Georgie. I got Larkin and Blake asleep and then went downstairs where Skye now was. We talked for a long time, until I could barely keep my eyes open. Skye was full of energy though. I asked her if she could put herself to bed. Today was a long, fun day!

Mike sent me pictures today of Preston with his ducks. How I miss that boy! He called me through the Slack app. I didn't know you could do that. It would be awesome if he can get through to me that way, since we don't have a home phone anymore and he doesn't have a cell phone. It was nice to talk to him.

Preston & Quackletta