Although I did feel a little like coming home when going up to Eden and walking across the balloon grounds. That's where I started face painting, and the year I started pushing my art. We are contemplating this is the last year we'll be doing the balloon festival unless we have more motivation next year. Their booth price goes up each year, and it's getting cost prohibitive.
Anyway - when our leaders talk about Sunday being a joy, well, today is certainly one. We got to sleep in and then took a nap after church, that's how worn out we were.
I have so many thoughts to share... I'm trying to figure out which to express first. Guess I'll go with the balloon festival first... It was great weather!! It got a little windy Friday night and so they didn't really do a glow, but it was nice. Saturday the wind came up a little in the afternoon, as per usual, and then went down enough they were able to do the balloon rides and do the glow. There wasn't very many balloons for the glow, but at least there was more than one. The band that we remembered being scheduled wasn't the same one that performed, but the music was okay. We were in a whole different spot, but the end crush was similar to what it usually is... sigh. I had some crazy requests. I did several pikachus and my first request for a B52 bomber!!
This kid is apparently quite the fan, and it was crazy. After I painted his, his little cousin wanted the same thing. At least it looks like an airplane, lol. He thought it was awesome, and that's all that really matters. I also got to do balloons on one girls arm. Only ones I painted the whole time. It was suggested several times, but no one really wanted them. The girl picked out the colors, so thats what we came up with. I had a couple of women get their faces painted, and one father did a pirate for his little girl. That was fun, I keep wishing I"d taken a photo of that. My wonderful hubby came up both days and helped soooo much on Saturday. I am always so very thankful that I married that man!! Tips were better on Friday than Saturday, which was kind of strange, but whatever. We also had a booth right next to us doing everything from Henna to facepaint as well. She was nice and I think we worked well together, but it was odd and several people commented on it. I think the organizers of the balloon event need to get together with other cities that do events and take notes... Roy days for example...now that's a well run event!!
One thing that I noticed happen yesterday made me want to give a shout out to the awesome mom. She had a couple of kids that she'd brought to get faces painted, but one of them had taken off and been a pill. As a result, she wasn't getting her face painted. period. And mother was sooo sweet about it. She didn't get angry, shout, or berate the girl. She just informed her that her own behavior had caused the situation and that she wouldn't be getting her face painted this time. The little girl said she was sorry, she would be nice, and mom was like, that's wonderful- I'm so glad. You should be nice all the time. But you're still not getting your face painted. lol. It was the most awesome parenting job I'd seen. She kept telling her she'd give her all the hugs she wanted, she loved her and was so glad she wanted to make a better choice for next time, but she was still not getting her face painted. I was so proud of her for sticking to her guns!Kudos to you, unknown mom who will never see this and never know you were being observed. If only more parents were like that...we see so many who are not in doing these booths.
There was one time when the parents were standing in front of our booth, and the little girl was trying to get her mothers attention. She was tapping her on the arm, repeating "mom" several times, and her mother was either ignoring her or had totally tuned her out. She went on and on - making some teenage girls standing next to her who were waiting to get painted comment to each other. I felt bad for the little girl... but you never know what the lead up to these situations are. Perhaps this kido routinely interrupts mom when she's talking, who knows. But she finally got moms attention and got her face painted.
I was also taught a lesson in humility - the woman whose booth was right next to us was not someone I'd normally associate with. She was prone to using foul language in general conversation, and was dressed a little coarse. Over the time we worked next to her and had opportunity to chat, we came to appreciate her sense of humor and her talents. While we were doing this as a couple, she made mention that her husband spent every dime she made and never wanted to do anything fun. I thought that was so sad... She expressed appreciation that we had been so nice to work with, and I was ashamed at my first impression.
That leads me to Sunday School today. We were talking about Roman's, and Pauls letters and how he was trying to encourage them to love everyone. We got to talking about how many people say living in Utah and growing up here if you aren't a member of the church is very hard. You feel ostracized. Having grown up in California with a neighborhood of kids who belonged to the church, some active, some not, I had never seen that. When I got to Utah and got married and started having children we discovered the issue with our own children and the friends they picked. They were somewhat ostracized because of their friends. I read an article a week or so ago about a young man who joined the church as an adult who had grown up with that. It made me sooo sad to know that good members of the church were unable to show love to non member neighbors.
The Lord is calling on us to be better... He is asking us to LOVE everyone, no matter what their beliefs, their income, their situation in life. Life is hard enough without having to worry about if someone is good enough to talk to or work with.
I hope any reader who comes across this is willing to open their heart to all and love as the Savior loves. I know I'm going to try harder to do so.
Hope you have a wonderful rest of your Sabbath. God Bless. :)
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