I Spent My Forty-Fifth Birthday in a Hot Air Balloon

It was the best birthday.

It was also a surprise, with Matt refusing to tell me where he was taking me, and refusing to confirm it EVEN WHEN I TOTALLY GUESSED CORRECTLY (we're going to ignore the fact that my correct guess came in the smack middle of 1,400 other incorrect guesses). 

But when the hot air balloon people drove up with hot air balloon baskets in the backs of their trucks, I knew my 7,000th guess had been correct! 

You might recall that hot air balloons are one of my Special Interests (read: low-key obsessions). I once got so excited pulling off the highway to watch hot air balloons that I forgot to put the car in park and Syd had to shout at me from the passenger seat, "Um, MOM?!?" so I could chase my car, hop back in, and keep my child from rolling into a pasture. I have read all the hot air ballooning histories, even the boring ones. I have watched all the hot air balloon movies. I follow every hot air balloon crash on the news. 

I LOVE THEM.

And for my birthday, Matt took me to ride in one!

We drove with the balloon operators out to a field south of town, and started setting up:

Here's our balloon operator, and one of the baskets that his company weaves by hand.

They unfurl the balloon across the field, then tip the basket over to face it.

There were other hot air balloons launching in our group:

As we watched the balloons get ready, and our crew let us pretend to help our own balloon get ready, I had the sudden, sick realization that Matt does NOT like heights.

"Um, are you coming with me?" I asked him. Because riding in a hot air balloon is definitely going to be the best experience of my life whether or not he's with me, but it would be maybe not the best possible experience I could ever possibly have if he wasn't with me.

So, was he coming with me?

He WAS!!!!!

The balloonists attached the balloon to the basket with cables and carabiners:

And then they got the propane going and started inflating the balloon!

And we got to help hold the balloon open!

Here is the only photo of me on this entire adventure. I was absolutely beside myself with excitement, and I was reluctant to give my camera over to Matt even for this photo because it meant taking my eyes off the balloon for a half-second!

Okay, back to work!

Finally, the balloon had enough hot air in it to start rising:

Everyone else's balloons were ready, as well, so off we went!

Welcome to the best moment of my life:

I am absolutely giddy with joy for the entire hour-long flight. There's me, Matt, and our balloon operator in the basket, and I am free to step wherever I want as long as I'm not in the operator's way. I can look straight up into the belly of the hot air balloon, straight down past the edge of the basket to see the ground, and out to all the horizons:

I imagine that, to the first balloonists, flight must have been a dizzying sensation, but desensitized as I am by cars and theme park rides and airplanes, the motion feels very calm and peaceful. If I couldn't see where we were going, I wouldn't know we were moving at all. 

These tall guys can hang onto the rigging at the top of the basket:

Here's our local university off in the distance:

We got a LOT higher than the other balloons in our group!

We flew over the stable where Will takes horseback riding lessons!

I was a little disappointed when we started flying over neighborhoods instead of forests and fields, but then I realized that this gives us an unfettered look into people's backyards!!!

And sometimes there are people looking back at us!

See the van in the photo? Crew in several vehicles followed us during our flight.

When we reached town, our balloon operator started looking for a convenient backyard to land in:

And then the balloon got deflated and rolled up, the basket unhooked and set back in the bed of the pickup truck:

Afterwards, we drove back to the company site for champagne and an impromptu tour around their facilities, including their sewing machines (I really, really, REALLY want to sew hot air balloons for a living!), their giant fabric printer, their patterns for novelty hot air balloons (they're currently sewing a giant gorilla balloon), and the baskets that they're weaving.

Our hot air balloon ride was SO FUN. It was everything you could want in an adventure--beautiful, magical, exciting, joyful, and with my favorite guy with me and not in a chase car down on the ground. It was a dream come true, and the best possible way to celebrate turning forty-five.

Although the takeout pizza and grocery store cake that we shared with the kids later that night was pretty great, too!

AP Human Geography: The Geography of Religion in Your Town

Here's an assignment that I gave Will for AP Human Geography, designed to get her exploring data and making her own connections:

OUR TOWN'S CHURCH MAP PROJECT

ASSIGNMENT: Map and analyze places of religious worship in our town.

1. Use Google Maps to create your own map in which you pin every place of worship in our town.

1. Use different colors or icons to differentiate the following:

1. Each religion (Christian, Jewish, Hindu, etc.)

2. Each denomination of the Christian religion (Catholic, Methodist, Anglican, etc.)

2. Refer to Rubenstein ch. 6 to make sure you’re searching for all religious faiths.

2. When your map is complete, use it to analyze the places of worship in our town. Use a combination of written analysis and graphs that you create. You should have at least five graphs or visual analyses, and at least one page of written analysis.

1. You will come up with your own criteria for analysis, but some possibilities might include:

1. the ratio of houses of worship to population numbers

2. the ratio of numbers of houses of worship of different faiths to each other

3. location trends that reveal dispersal of houses of worship of different faiths

This turned out to be a fun way to manipulate data, as well as a sneaky way to reinforce Will's understanding of the different religions and denominations for her AP Human Geography exam. 

Will's map was particularly interesting to me. For a long while I've had the idea that our area has a large evangelical population, and Will's map, in which she's labeled the evangelical churches with burgundy pins, seems to bear that out, although interestingly, the population of evangelical churches skews toward the south of town. I'd be curious to see the map stretched farther in all directions, actually, as to the east and west of town it's also pretty rural. Does a rural setting correlate to a larger evangelical church population?

Here's her ratio of religions in our town:

This pie chart was a good spot to show Will how the data can be expanded and contextualized with further information. For instance, the ratio of Buddhism might seem a little high, but some of the Dalai Lama's family live here, and there's an excellent Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center here. You can speculate, then, about how these pull factors might affect the ratio. 

If you were an AP Human Geography student, you could perhaps even write an essay on that topic!

After seeing Will's map, I'm not as surprised by her ratio of Christian denominations:

Can you see the artifact where she used the eraser tool on this graphic? She had to edit it because she'd accidentally typed "LSD"--oops!

Since Will is almost completely unfamiliar with organized religion (shame on me!), a very important component of the AP Human Geography exam, I thought that this project worked well to give her an understanding that hopefully felt a little more hands-on than just reading chapter 6 of Rubenstein. Not only does she have a sensorial understanding of what the map of our town represents, but we can also drive around and literally look at these buildings that we've driven past her whole life, or stop and walk around them, study the architecture, etc. 

To be honest, I don't know if this more personal type of project *really* helped make the concepts in chapter 6 less abstract for Will, but she DID score a 5 on her AP Human Geography exam, so there you go!

Easy Handmade Gift: Matted Photo in a Thrifted Frame

This tutorial was originally published on Crafting a Green World in 2016.

 Need a gift that's easy to make but still personal? A matted photo that you make yourself can be just the thing! 

You use a photo or artwork that lets your recipients know that you're thinking only of them, and yet the actual matting and framing of the photo takes less than an hour and costs less than five bucks. 

 Key to this project is the thrifted frame. If you've never gone thrifting for frames, I highly recommend it! Many people, when they get tired of what's inside the frame, just donate the entire piece, frame and all. Our local Goodwill stores have monthly 50%-off storewide sales, and whenever I go to them, I always look through their frames and take home the ones that I like. I generally repaint them for use in my own house, but this gold one that I pulled out of my stash (with the price tag on the back: $1.50!), even though I'd have painted it navy or slate for myself, will actually go perfectly well as-is in the recipient's home. That's one fewer step for me! 

 If you do want to refinish your frame, check out my round-up of the best methods. Scroll down to the paint and fabric tute to see how I refinish my frames 99% of the time. 

 The next thing that you need is a lovely paper to cover the thrifted frame's existing mat board. You're not making a piece that has to look perfect in a thousand years, so I don't worry overly much about the acidity of the papers that I use. This is a gift for your grandma or your girlfriend, not the Queen of England. 

In my own house, I have frames covered in dictionary pages, comic book pages, and wallpaper samples, but for this particular frame, I'm using handmade paper from a little book that has a looooong story, full of drama, from my wedding. So much drama that some of the pages ended up getting torn out. Ask me about it in the Comments and I'll tell you. Buy us a pitcher of margaritas, and I'll tell you some even worse stories of my wedding drama! 

 I decoupaged the handmade paper to the mat board, tearing the paper into strips and overlapping the edges into straight lines to make the piece look somewhat orderly. The handmade paper is neutral-toned, as well, so it doesn't distract from the photo. 

To attach the paper to the mat board, I just used double-sided tape. Now, tape is something that you DO want to be picky about, because a lot of tape is horrible and will begin to discolor your work within months, so it's best to have handy some kind of tape that says it's "document-friendly." 

 If you've got that document-friendly tape, you can also use it to attach the photo to the decoupaged mat board, but if you're worried, just use photo corners. 

That was such a beautiful road trip!

 Honestly, the biggest pain in the butt when using a thrifted frame is cleaning that glass! These frames have sat in someone's house for decades, sometimes, and I don't know what all they have on them, but it can be gross. I use straight vinegar in a spray bottle, scrubbed off with crumpled-up newspaper (this is also how I clean windows and mirrors), repeated until whatever gunk is all over the glass finally comes off. 

 The last thing that you have to do is simply re-assemble the frame, making sure that you have the hanger on the back correct. 

Wrap it up, add a pretty bow, and wait for the squeals of happiness when your thoughtful gift is opened!