Thematic Photographic 111 - Kids

Up, up and away
London, ON, July 2010

Please note: This photo launches our new Thematic Photographic theme, kids. For the coming week, we hope you'll share pictures of kids, pictures about kids, or pictures that make us think of life before kids. Whatever you wish, as long as you have fun with it. Read on for more.

When a hot air balloon flies so low that you swear you could touch its basket and count the number of rings on the fingers of its passengers, you know it's an experience your kids will remember. So when I heard the telltale sound of the propane burners coming from behind the tree line, I reached for the camera and told the munchkins to stop whatever they were doing and look up.

We were visiting friends on the kind of perfect summer evening that easily becomes a lifetime memory for a child. As the adults sat and chatted in the back yard, we easily heard our combined broods playing. Everything was right with the world as the air filled with happy, co-operative voices, punctuated by the occasional back-and-forth of a couple of exuberantly sweet dogs.

The balloon dropping to near-treetop level was the exclamation point on an already ideal moment. The kids screamed and waved. The passengers waved back. The pilot kept the balloon in sight for as long as he could safely do so before he hit the burners and returned to higher altitude.

We'll likely never know who these folks are, but for a brief moment in time, they connected with our kids and gave them something neat to hold on to. On this day as on so many others, it was quite the privilege to stand back and watch it all play out.

Your turn: Please share a kid-themed photo on your blog, then leave a link to it in a comment here. Visit other participants to spread the photographic happiness. For more info on how Thematic Photographic, our weekly photo sharing feature, works, please click here. And if you'd like to share a moment from YOUR summer (this one or any other) that's worth remembering, wed love that, too.