It was a clear crisp early morning about 12:30-12:45 am. 2 friends and myself were walking their dog before going to sleep for the evening, when gazing at the sky while walking I noticed a red lantern type object in the NW part of the sky that slowly began to head toward us descending at the same time. It was clearly not a star, comet/asteroid or baloon. I would assume it was less than a mile from us before it shifted direction East and ascended meandering up and down going farther North East until it disappears out of view. It did not hold a flight pattern like anything I have seen. It remarkably resembled those red chinese lanterns they light for prayer, though this was not constructed from paper nor was it a baloon. The red was a constant color with no flickering lights or light beams. The 3 of us were pretty sure we just witnessed a space craft of some sort. It was awesome, though we went home and just went on with our lives, not thinking to do something or tell someone about it. It wasn't until Feb 2012, when visiting those same friends, when they showed me a video of similar red lantern type UFO's, but in clusters of 10 or 15, did I really believe what I had seen the previous year. The last minute of the viral video "Mass Media UFO Sightings" has several of the exact same type of red lantern UFO's. The moment I saw the red, it made the hair stand up all over my body. I decided to file this report to see if there have been similar sightings. I did not take any pictures. The Mass Media UFO video has the red lanterns, for your reference.