Busy busy week

I haven't had time to download pictures from the last week yet, we have been so very busy. We were in Brookfield, MO this past weekend at the 34th Annual Great Pershing Balloon Derby.

We started out crewing for our friend Lynn with Skydreamer, but ended up being fortunate enough to fly Mai'Ken Dreams Sunday morning. There was a bit of an 'incident' Saturday evening at the glow, when our friend Jim Wolters that flies the Missouri Lottery Balloon had a small mishap that caused damage to his envelope. He was doing well in the standings and wanted to fly Sunday morning, but didn't have an envelope. We were all lucky enough that we happened to have brought our system, so Jim and Kenny took off in Mai'Ken Dreams for the competition flight Sunday morning. Jim started out flying for the competition and placed 5th for the morning. As soon as that was done, he let Kenny take over the burner and continue to fly. Kenny got his high speed landing in!! He flew 16 miles in 41 minutes, they were a truckin' right along! He also found the most remote place to land, with the worse roads to get to him. Thanks to the GPS on his phone, and the GPS we had in the truck, Mom, Dad and I were finally able to locate him, in the valley of a CPR field. It was a very exciting day for the Mai'Ken Dreams crew. We didn't get any more flights in after that as the wind decided it wanted to blow 90 to nothin'.

Tuesday night Tim Graham signed Kenny off to do his solo flight and it was wonderful. He had a nice 30 minute flight with a perfect landing in a very tight spot. We were there to catch him and celebrate. Special thanks to Tim for all his help in Kenny's training. Also thanks to Mom and Dad, Stacie and Jesse and Brian for coming out to crew with us for his first solo. Adam was also there to meet us upon landing. We had a big celebration with Kenny wearing a bottle of champagne. Good thing we brought along an extra shirt!!

I will try to post pictures soon, as soon as I get rid of this poison ivy and get the darn yard mowed.

Soft landings and congratulations to my Love Dove on his first solo flight, along with many more to come.