I am participating in a ” 31 Days of…” series for the month of October. You see a whole bunch of sweet blogger buddies have been getting together the past few years to do 31 posts in 31 days. The topic is always something they have a passion for. This year they have invited all of their readers to post 31 days of their passions. If you are interested in participating in the 31 Days of…series, or you’re just curious about what everyone else is writing about, please visit The Nester, Jen, Melissa, Sandy, Darcy, Emily, and Emily. I hope you enjoy my series on finding treasures both vintage and of the heart. Let’s hope I can overcome my inconsistent blogging habit and share those 31 posts within the next 31 days!

Well, after enjoying a nice weekend of  just being, I completely forgot that I was supposed to continue on with my 31 Days series even on the weekends. Oopsie! I’ll try to do better, promise!

Anywho, in keeping with my theme of treasures, and  the treasure of being, or the treasure of experiencing all the beautiful and marvelous blessings around us. Today, I wanted to share with you the joy of living in New Mexico. Particularly, in Albuquerque during Balloon Fiesta. If you are not familiar with the Albuquerque International Balloon Fiesta, please visit their site. And if you are too lazy to click on the link, the Balloon Fiesta is a yearly hot air balloon rally held the first full week in October.  Over 500 hot air balloons participate yearly. Which makes for quite a display when you consider every balloon is different, and they even have special shapes. My favorite this year was Spider Pig…

via Balloon Fiesta

If you aren’t a Simpson’s fan then you probably didn’t get the joke. Just in case you haven’t seen the Simpson’s movie here’s a clip:

While running around town chasing balloons, at the begining of October (because frankly Bubba and I are too cheap to buy tickets to the actual fiesta), we had the great opportunity to see a lot of balloons hovering over our fair city. And you know the old saying, “What comes up must come down”, that includes balloons. So we get to see our fair share of balloons landing and deflating. It really takes all the air out of the experience! (HAR-HAR)

Here’s one we saw the first day of the fiesta…

Landing, apparently she must be caught and held down or she stays in the air. I’m certainly not a hot air balloon expert. I’m just an observer.

After she’s been caught a tarp is laid out and the balloon is held down by ropes.

Then they start to let the air out of the balloon. Air part of the balloon is turned off, and they start to pull on those ropes.

The balloon is still being held by ropes, but it’s mostly down.

It sort of looks like they are letting the air out of an air bed to me.

It was a lot like taking the air out of an air bed.

After all the air was squeezed out they rolled it up. Much like a sleeping bag.

See that guy with a group of kids? Yeah, they are sitting on the balloon. Apparently, there was still some air to get rid of before placing the folded up balloon in it’s basket. A good time was had by all, I’m so glad Bubba and I took the time to stop, and enjoy the treasure of being.

And Annie-dog got a little closer to getting over her fear of bouncy houses and balloons. I guess it helped to see one go down, you could say it took the air out of her fear!

Isn’t my Bubba a sweetie? He lets me take boo-hoos of pictures while he gets pulled around by our lovable but bratty poochies. By the way, he’s all mine, and no big sister, I will not let you have him when I’m done. Even though I promised to share my future husband with you when I was five!