Category Archives: balloons

Balloon Festival!

Thursday kicked off the Adirondack Balloon Festival, which is a big highlight in our area.  There are launches all weekend and a mini launch on Thursday to get things going. We can walk to the park where the mini launch is, which is really nice to be able to avoid parking!

About 14 balloons go up in the park.  

It was cloudy, but no wind, so launch was a go.

.

.

Here is a balloon just getting laid out:

The basket, which looks really small!

I can’t believe they can cram 3 or 4 people in there.

Big fan blowing air in:

.

.

Now time for the flame:

It was hot standing near this. It must have been really hot for that guy!

Inflated. Night of the lepus!

I had to back up to get a picture of the full balloon 😀

I love the balloons!  The launches over the weekend have 80-100 balloons going up. It is held at the county airport. It’s very crowded and parking is difficult, so we don’t go too often. We have ridden bikes, but if the launch is late – it starts to get dark while we ride home.  Some day I would like to get up for the daybreak launch, but that is pretty early LOL!

Balloon Fest

It’s that time of year – the Adirondack Balloon Festival!  There are just so many great things in our area and this is one of them. The crowds are quite large and traffic is a nightmare on one of the main roads near our house. There are 6 scheduled launches starting Thursday night small launch, but they are all weather dependent.  No flights were cancelled this year, although Thursday night they didn’t fly because of breeze.

We were able to walk to the Thursday night launch at Crandall park, which is so nice because we didn’t have to worry about parking and whatnot.  We waited for a long time while they decided whether to launch or not. The breeze was just a bit much, but the balloonists inflated up.  I don’t mind the not flying because my favorite part is getting up close and personal with the balloons.

.

.

It’s so neat to be by the balloons. It was really hot in this part because of the burners:

.

More on the Folds of Honor in a bit.  There was one shaped balloon at this launch:

Turtle!

While the balloons didn’t fly, a couple did a small lift over to the next field on the other side of those trees. One balloon actually hit a tree limb, but they were fine.

.

The Adirondack Balloon Fest was the introduction of the Dreamship balloon.   Folds of Honor is an organization that provides scholarships to children of fallen service men and women.

The balloon is made up of drawings from children who have received scholarships. They drew a picture of their dreams and the balloon is them taking flight.

Very inspiring and moving.

Until next year, balloons!

Balloons!

Time for the Adirondack Balloon Festival!  We didn’t go last year, and I think it was because the weather was bad?  The balloons really have to be picky about what they launch in.

Anyway, I wanted to go to the Friday evening launch since that seemed to be the one with the best chance of happening this weekend weather wise.  The nice thing is that this is held at the municipal airport, which is 6 miles away and totally bikeable.  Saves on parking (and the environment!).

At first, we weren’t sure if the balloons were going to go up at all since it was breezy, and I had a certain window of time that I had to leave by to make it home by dark.  Just when we were thinking of leaving, they started to inflate some balloons.

 

One reason I love balloon festivals is that you can go right into the launch area and get close to them.  They are so huge – pictures do not do them justice.

 

Some new balloons this year.  Wicked!

wicked

Pepe Le Peu:

pepe

Horton the Elephant – one of my faves!

horton

Spider Pig.  I should have gone around to the other side for this one.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

He wasn’t ready to go with his droopy legs LOL!

Going overhead:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The strawberry is a crowd favorite.

strawberry

This was some kind of giant bird – a hummingbird, I think?  Sandwiched between Horton and Spider Pig:

ballon trio

Another one of my favorites.  Claw’D The Crazy Crab.

crab balloon

A lot of balloons have names, so I didn’t make that up. 😀

That’s Pig Headed in the background.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Pigs really do fly!

 

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

I couldn’t watch the rest of the balloons because I needed to get biking! This was as I was leaving and the balloons were going over the traffic control tower:

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

I had to zoom home and it was getting darker than I liked to ride in.  I have a flashing red light for the back of my bike, but I could have used a headlight.  Worth it, though!

Speaking of biking, it was windy, but we got out this weekend on both days for a total of 50+ miles.  Rolled over 2000!

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

Now I can officially start counting down since there is just under 500 miles to go. Tick, tick, tick, tick, tick.

What’s Ballooning!

Another week has flown by. And the rain is out of here – thank you!  Everything is so waterlogged.  I was glad to get on my bike again this morning.  I haven’t ridden since last Saturday, can you believe it?  I did a quick 8 miles before breakfast and it felt great!

Friday has turned into oats day around here.  That was what I made this morning.  I did custard oats (just the egg whites whisked in, no banana) and topped with coconut butter and the blueberry jam I made for the jam swap (which are ready to mail).

So good.  I looked at the bowl this morning and said “Coconut butter, where have you been all my life??”  This worried John.  😆

Lots of work to do today, but not a great day on the production front.  Lori no like days like that.  Too many little short reports and it is hard to get the line count up per hour.  That’s when working on production stinks.

I stopped for a lunch break:

BBQ chicken and laughing cow.  And our last pear.  I will have to eat something else on tomorrow’s bike ride.

I had a lovely box arrive today!  Plants!

I have a rose bush to move and put 3 of these plants in place of that, and the others will go on the small strip  of garden where buddha sits and needs work.

I told Pixie to stay out of the plants, and then John calls to me that she is eating them.  D’oh!

Bad kitteh…

Afternoon break time.

The sun is out today and it just feels so much more cheerful.  Don’t you agree?

This weekend is full of happenings.  Well, the whole fall is full of stuff to do around here.  It is the start of festival season.  On tap for tonight is the Sunkiss Balloon Festival.  The balloons launch in the late afternoon, so I had to put off dinner and have a couple slices of dried pineapple to tide me over.

Off for ballooning!

This felt hot to stand near:

This balloon was new this year and one of my favorites:

Giant shaped balloons:

An as a kind of a ceremonial 9/11 tribute, the American Flag balloon:

I really love the balloons.  They will be floating all weekend as well.

My mother and I went out for dinner afterwards to O’Tooles.  I was pretty hangry!  I ordered the bangers and mash:

Tasty – and gahlicky!  Hello dragon breath!  All in all a good night.  Tomorrow we need to decide what to do.  There are quite a few events in the area.  Choices, choices!  We will be biking whatever we decide to do.

Have a super weekend!

Up, up and away

A blissful Friday.  I have Sunday off from work because of the Charity Ride and John said it was a 3 day weekend for me.  Yes – just like a 3 day weekend except I have to work today…. 🙄

It was a chilly morning and I headed out at 7 am for a run.  About a 1/2 mile in, it started to sprinkle on me.  I figured there is no difference between sweat and rain (except salt content), so I kept going. I don’t like wet shoes, though.  I did 3 miles today and I was thinking about how easy it felt.  All that biking has sure been doing a lot for my running, I have to say 😀

I was ready for brekkie when I got back.

I got some jams yesterday in the jam swap I participated in.  Dina sent me marionberry jam and blueberry jam!  Yay!  So – onto the banana custard oats it went!

Last of the almond butter as well, time to get out the food processor!   I commenced to some work – relaxed style.

Lunch time!  Something different, just because it is Friday.

Why yes, that is cauliflower.  Roasted in the toaster oven along with the fish sticks.  They were both done at the same time.  I like convenience.

More work after lunch.  I got an email about the Charity Ride on Sunday.  There are 93 riders all together on the 3 different distances.  There are 51 riders doing the 62 mile ride, so I won’t be alone.  Well, I won’t start alone at any rate.  Probably will end last :mrgreen:  This is the first organized bike ride I have ever done.  I forget that I won’t be climbing the hills or finishing the route by myself.  There is a sag wagon and a mechanics vehicle for problems, plus a couple rest/snack stops at 20-mile intervals.  No worries.  I do find myself alternating between excitement and panic.  That stupid 5-mile hill really has stuck itself in my mind.  I must tell myself it is okay if I need to walk up some of that hill.  It’s not a race, and the kids that attend this camp have way more problems in their lives than I do with this hill.   Weather looks iffy that day.  Supposed to be showers and it will be chilly with a high of 64.  I wanted to wear my Rosie jersey, but I think I need a long sleeve shirt since morning temps will be upper 40s/low 50s.

Afternoon snack with a latte:

Instead of the usual What’s Blooming, I thought I would show you something different!  (I’ll do flowers tomorrow). Today was the start of one of the local balloon festivals!  My mom and I went to see the evening launch tonight.

It’s neat because you can get up and close to the balloons taking off.

I loved this balloon!

I was hungry as it was dinner time, so I brought along sustenance.

Kinda creepy, eh?

Me and my mom!

Up, up, and away!

We went out for dinner afterwards.  Since John wasn’t with, we could go to Steve’s Place (he doesn’t like it there).

I love the breakfast all day!  I got an eggbeater cheese omelet with wheat toast.

I ate all but a small smidgen of the omelet.  Yum!

A very nice day, all in all.  We are in the stride of festival time around here.

Question:  Ever been to a balloon launch?

7-miler and views of myself

After last night’s Reeses throwdown (which I lost), I knew I needed a little extra boost on the exercise front today.  Not to mention my football dinner 😀

I wanted to go at least 6 miles.  Had a Zone Fudge Graham bar to start with.  Bars and bagels really and truly are the best preworkout fuel, although yogurt smoothies come in a close 2nd.  I did a daisy loop around the house.  A newly mapped 2 mile run, which turned out to be way more hilly than I thought.  I was a little tired from that, probably because of yesterday’s workout.  I wound back to home, drank some H2O and did a 3 mile loop.  For whatever reason, around mile 4.5 I got an energy boost.  Back at home for more water and then another 2 mile loop.  7+ total today.  I didn’t wear my watch.  I have decided that on long runs where I have a set distance to go, I don’t want to know the time.  It’s depressing to look down and see 20 minutes and know that I have more than 45 minutes left, you know?  I figure I will be done when I am done.

In the spirit of Operation Beautiful – I am showing that I am beautiful when I am sweaty!

sweaty

Had super delicious oats when I returned.  John cooked up one of the pie pumpkins last night in the pressure cooker and here is some fresh pumpkin!

pumpkin

Take *that* Libby’s!!

Added to my oats with a tsp of brown sugar and cinnamon and topped with cranberry preserves.

freshoats

So fresh tasting and yummy!

I am trying to think of ways to organize my blog into more helpful posts other than just me blabbing on about food and fitness of my own.  I am not sure if 2 posts a day is better or just 1.  I don’t like to overwhelm readers and I am not sure if it is better to have 2 shorter posts or 1 really long one as I am doing currently.  Any thoughts on this?

Yesterday I was talking with John over breakfast about the view I have of myself.  I had looked through some old pictures the other day and it is so weird seeing myself at 250 pounds in photos.  I almost don’t recognize myself in them.  However, I also look at photos of me now and think “Do I really look like that?”.  When I see myself in the mirror or look down at my legs, I have that sort of mix of still feeling heavy, yet feeling smaller.  I don’t know if I can describe it and not sure if any of you get what I mean.  Maybe it’s a feeling that is magnified by how much weight one has lost.  I said something to John about being chubby, and he said I wasn’t chubby at all.  In fact he called me a healthy dynamo, which kind of made me laugh.  Makes me think of this:

spinningtaz2

John asked how long it would be before I saw myself as I really am, and I don’t know.  It’s like not seeing myself as an athlete, but I think I am a bit of one.  Certainly not of a professional caliber, but one nonetheless.  I really don’t know how to correct that way of thinking, either.  I don’t view myself in any negative light and actually tend to be kind of clinical in how I look at the areas that I think need improvement. Maybe that isn’t really a bad way to think, I don’t know.

I spent the majority of 40 years being overweight and maybe it will take 40 before I get used to seeing me as I am LOL!

Well – it was my football winning dinner tonight!  Decided on downtown Glens Falls and stopped at Prima.  Yum.  They normally aren’t open for dinner on Thursdays, but tonight was a special night.

I had a delicious panini made on artisan wheat bread, turkey, brie, sprouts, and cranberry chutney.  So good!

prima

After dinner we walked around downtown.  Prima was open because it was opening night of balloon fest weekend!  (Guess you know what kind of pictures are coming up in a day or so 😀  ).

b2

They let us walk inside this balloon.  Here is a view from the inside out!

insideb

That was fun!

PSA – Another first time triathlete coming up this weekend!  Give PubsGal some love!

I’m off to do a little more work and indulge in my guilty pleasure of Project Runway!