Close Encounters of the Balloon Kind

Until this morning my balloon sightings of this Creston Balloon Days Weekend have been in the distance; very pretty SW of McKinley Lake yesterday morning as Budbo completed the 5K Walk/Run.
I was sitting here in the 'office' earlier this morning when I heard whooshing. No doubt in my mind what that was! I grabbed the camera, donned the flip flops and rushed outside to begin snapping. The balloon in this picture is not even the one which came closest. A little later one flew very low right over the house. I talked to the people in the basket. Great fun and so beautiful.
My first close encounter with a hot air balloon was in the 1970's when the kids and I were still living on the acreage (Our House) northwest of Urbandale. A balloon landed in a field west of the house near Cutty's campground.
Of course Indianola had a huge hot air balloon festival each year in August; something we never attended until one weekend when Bud's mom, Lottie, and son, Mark, spent a weekend with us. That would have been late '80s. In the early 90's, we also took some of the grandkids to the Indianola balloon festival. Those were fun, but nothing like standing on your own deck and watching them waft by.
Being a passenger in a hot air balloon used to be one of my biggest desires. Now I'm afraid I would be too afraid to go up in one - something about fear of heights or vertigo as I've gotten older. I still think I might be able to do it - overcome the fear enough to get into the basket - once there, I think I would be o.k. and I know I would love it. Maybe gliding over the countryside in a hot air balloon needs to go on my bucket list.
My favorite close encounter of the balloon kind happened early in the new millennium. Mom called one Sunday morning (much like this one) to say there was a balloon flying south of us. Her neighbor had called her to tell her it had gone over her house. We stood in Mom's front yard and watched as the balloon landed in a field about a quarter mile away. It paused awhile, long enough for me to fetch my camera, then took off again. It was still quite low as it passed over the field just west of Mom's house. Low enough that I have a picture of my sweet Mother with a big hot air balloon flying over her shoulder.