Part One: The Balloon wish begins

It was the night before autumn break started, and Verity and I were already thinking about what the holidays would bring. We always manage to do something fun together, and we wondered what it would be this time.

As we were sitting eating dinner at the kitchen table, Mummy’s phone rang. We could hear her saying, “Yes, yes, and yes again. And then breakfast, lunch, and dinner, and Imi and Harry.” Verity and I looked at one another, knowing that something exciting was being planned.

When Mummy put the phone down, Daddy asked, “What was that all about?” Before Mummy could even answer, her phone rang again. This time we could hear her say, “Yes, Imi and Harry. Yes, Niamh and Jesse, followed by breakfast, lunch, and dinner.” Verity and I looked at each other again. All of our best friends’ names had been mentioned! “That is, it then, tomorrow is sorted,” said Mummy. She looked at us and smiled. “Niamh, Jesse, Imi, and Harry will be coming over tomorrow and spending the whole day with us!” We jumped for joy.

Verity and I went to bed too excited to sleep. The thought of having our friends at our house for a full day sounded wonderful, but we were unsure what we would actually do. Still, we knew that whatever happened, it would be good. Verity started to plan what she was going to wear because she wanted to be prepared for all kinds of activities. I wanted to show them my magnetic blocks so we could build something together. As we lay in bed, the delicious smell of cooking drifted up from the kitchen. Mummy was getting ready for the big day by baking cupcakes, biscuits, and homemade bread. The warm scents wafted upstairs and into our bedroom. At least we will have something nice to eat, I thought. With that comforting idea, I finally fell asleep.

Verity and I woke early the next morning. Mummy suggested that we put on comfortable play clothes since we would probably play both inside and out, and we both agreed. I had completely forgotten that since the last time our friends visited, we had received a special delivery of a new seesaw! We thought Verity and I could show them how to use it. We felt that Jesse and Harry would like the seesaw the most, while Niamh always liked the swing, and Imi loved to climb on our climbing frame. I just hoped it wouldn't rain so we could spend plenty of time outside.

We waited at the kitchen table for our friends to arrive. Mummy made us a cup of milky tea each and went over a few dos and don’ts for the day so that everything would run smoothly. We both nodded our heads and said we would try our best. We knew that if the day went badly, our friends might not come back to visit, and we definitely didn’t want that.

Before too long, the doorbell rang. The dogs started to bark, just as excited for visitors as we were. We all rushed to the front door and saw Mrs Cotswold standing outside. 

We noticed her bright red lipstick first of all. Next, we saw that she wore a scarf with a leaf pattern and a very warm winter coat. Finally, we looked down at her shoes. Just like always, one of her shoes had a big hole in it, and her big toe poked right out! Verity and I looked at one another and smiled. Behind her stood Imi, Harry, Niamh, and Jesse. They all had big smiles on their faces and backpacks strapped to their backs. Mummy quickly called them into the house to get out of the icy cold wind and thanked Mrs Cotswold for dropping them off.

We all went into the kitchen and sat at the dining room table. Mummy made delicious tomato and cheese toasties using the fresh bread she had baked, alongside more cups of milky tea. Everyone chatted happily about various things, but Verity kept interrupting to say, “I want to go on a hot air balloon!” I wasn't sure where she had gotten the idea from—she had probably seen one on television.

People took no notice of her request at first, until Imi finally asked, “Why?” Verity hadn’t thought that far ahead and simply shrugged her shoulders, though she continued to make her request anyway. 

Usually, when she asks for this type of thing, Mummy and Daddy say, “Okay, let’s do it.” This time, however, going in a hot air balloon was not only expensive, but nowhere near where we live even offered hot air balloon flights. Mummy just replied, “One day when you are older you can go!” Mummy hoped that Verity would be satisfied with her response and move on to a new topic.

After breakfast, Mummy told us to go outside to play while she cleaned up the kitchen. Verity couldn't wait to show everyone how the seesaw worked. She couldn't help herself from saying, “See, it goes up and down like a hot air balloon!” A few minutes later, Verity climbed to the top of the climbing frame and called out, “If you stand here, you can see Daddy flying his helicopter in the sky, and hot air balloons!” She then ran over to the swing, moving it back and forth through the air. “Look, it is like being in the basket of a hot air balloon!” By now, we all realized we were going to hear about hot air balloons all day long. Suddenly, it started to rain, forcing us all back inside the house.

We sat at the kitchen table again and tried to think of what to do next. Mummy suddenly jumped up and down and said, “I have an idea!” We all looked at her, wondering what it could be. She seemed so excited that we instantly felt excited too. Mummy started to move the furniture in the lounge room to make a large clearing on the floor. Mummy and Daddy had recently bought a new washing machine because the old one broke down and couldn't be fixed, and the appliance had arrived in a massive cardboard box. Mummy dragged the large box into the lounge room and placed it right in the centre of the floor. We all stared at it. Mummy smiled and said, “We are going to make a hot air balloon!” With that, we all started jumping up and down.

Mummy explained that the cardboard box would serve as our basket. She asked us one by one to climb inside to see if we would all fit, and we did! Once we climbed back out, Mummy brought over a box of crayons so we could decorate the outside. We sat around the cardboard, each taking a section to draw and colour whatever designs we wanted. When we finished, we admired each other's artwork. It was fun to see what everyone had created.

“What next?” asked Verity.

Mummy told us to sit on the sofa for a moment. She brought a few chairs from the kitchen and placed them in a circle around the box. Then, she fetched a large throw blanket from the linen closet and stretched it across the tops of the chair backs. Mummy stood back and said, “See? The blanket is like the balloon fabric before the hot air is pumped into it!”

We could see exactly what she meant. In a determined voice, Verity asked, “But how do we get it up into the air?”

Mummy went into the laundry room and returned with a broom. She placed the broom handle inside the box, using the top to lift the throw blanket much higher into the air. “How is that?” asked Mummy. We all looked at one another and nodded in approval. We all climbed back into the box, wondering what to do next. Imi said, “We need to put hot air into the balloon.” I pretended to pull tightly on the burner rope—which was actually a piece of ribbon attached to the end of the broom handle. I felt very proud to be making good use of it. Niamh made a loud, realistic whooshing sound to mimic the flames. Verity proudly announced, “Take off!” Jesse and Harry just watched us with a smile, comfortably sitting at the bottom of the box to play with the magnetic blocks.

Part Two: Exploring the World and Beyond

“Where shall we go?” asked Niamh.

We all shrugged our shoulders. Just then, Mummy passed by, saw us all squeezed into the box, and overheard our chatter. She suggested we could visit places we had been to on holiday, or places we would like to go. Then she had another brilliant idea: “Why don't you think about what you have been learning at school?” We all nodded eagerly.

Mummy asked what we had been studying lately, and Imi replied, “Biomes!”

That might help, we thought. Verity looked a little quizzically at us because she was younger, not in our class, and didn't know what “biomes” meant.

Imi blurted out, “Let’s fly over the ocean first!”

We all agreed. Peering over the edge of our cardboard basket, we pretended to see dolphins leaping, sea turtles gliding, and schools of tropical fish. I pointed down and said I thought I could see the Great Barrier Reef, making everyone go, “Oooooooohhhh!” Niamh giggled and pretended a stray seagull had just landed right on the edge of our basket. Suddenly, Verity pointed into the room and shouted in a very loud voice, “Whale!” We all jumped, and even Harry and Jesse stood up to take a look. The lounge room filled with our laughter.

Niamh spoke up next. “Let’s go to the desert now. I have always wanted to ride on a camel!” So, we all pretended to fly our hot air balloon over a vast desert. We took turns describing the massive amounts of sand rolling out below us, and we talked about how there are both hot deserts and cold deserts. Imi mentioned the lack of rain and explained how cacti can live on very little water. Niamh shared that they actually had cacti plants in their garden at home. Deciding it was time to explore, we "landed" the balloon and climbed out of the box. We spent the next ten minutes pretending to take a grand camel ride all around the house. Niamh was thrilled that her desert wish had finally come true.

Next, we decided to visit the North Pole. We knew that the temperature there would be extremely cold, dry, and windy. Before we got back into the box, we all pretended to put on heavy winter layers. We placed make-believe woolly hats on our heads, zipped up thick warm coats, pulled on snow boots, and slipped on gloves. Imi tried to remember the different types of animals that lived in the freezing cold. When she listed foxes and reindeer, Verity automatically shouted, “Polar bears!” I proudly remembered that this frozen biome was called the tundra and that the ground beneath the snow is permanently frozen. With that, Verity shivered and said, “I am cold.” Mummy overheard and instantly invited us to her "Tundra Café." She set up the coffee table with mugs of hot chocolate and fluffy marshmallows for morning tea. We all happily slurped our warm drinks and sucked on the sweet marshmallows.

Once morning tea was finished, Imi decided she wanted to see lions. We all piled back into the cardboard box and pretended to fly over the wild grasslands. We spotted imaginary lions, zebras, bison, and prairie dogs, noting that there weren't many trees around, just lots and lots of sweeping grass. Imi let out a mighty roar like a lion, and we all copied her until the room was full of roaring children.

Mummy pretended that our balloon had flown all the way to Japan and had prepared us delicious, traditional bento-style lunch boxes. Each compartment held something different: chicken, rice, various vegetables, and a cupcake for dessert. I handed everyone a pair of chopsticks to use. Imi and Niamh struggled a bit at first, but they quickly got the hang of it. Harry and Jesse were still a bit too young for chopsticks, so I gave them each a fork. We sat on the floor around the coffee table, pretending we were dining in a traditional Japanese teahouse, eating our tasty food in peaceful quiet.