Not-so-festive, but bright

Last week, my uncle died. I was shocked and very sorry. The funeral was held just under a week later, and I got an email that after the service there would be a reception to celebrate his life. Celebrate. Well, what celebrates and is more festive than balloons, right? I know what you're thinking... Balloons? At a funeral? I got that same reaction from my aunt. I was scared to start, but I went in the back yard where the kids were playing, and sure enough, they didn't have a problem with the balloons. In fact they loved them. They wanted to pump them up, and have swords for sword fights. I learned a new sword before going down, and I"m glad I did. It was a two balloon sword where the blade is both balloons twisted together. It's much prettier than the average sword, and the kids liked 'em too.

The balloons didn't last long. They had been in the sun, and as soon as they touched the lawn they popped. But they were enjoyed, and that's the whole point.

Happy Birthday

Saturday - Today, in honor of my husband's birthday, I made a birthday cake... out of balloons. Yes I made the other kind too. This one actually took longer. I made a five wheel spoke, made pinch twists at the same distance from the center, and then connected the remaining tail to the pinch twist of the next spoke. Once all five were joined together, I made a small bubble, a pinch twist, then a long bubble joining the next balloon in the "spoke." After about three layers, I ran out of balloon. I could have added more balloons, but that's as far as I went. Then I made a string of bubbles across the top edge to represent the icing. I made a small orange bubble out of scrap, took a white scrap piece of balloon and inflated it partially and tied its knot to the orange bubble. I pushed the two knots down into the white balloon and made it sort of a tulip twist, which held the two knots inside the balloon. And there you have it.

Hearts and Flowers... but first a duck.

I'm just being honest with the title. Sorry if it sounds weird. I think it might be appropriate maybe to start explaining the process of how I get these sculptures done. First is the poptub fuck. I learned it from the Happy Cabbie on YouTube. I start out with a balloon that is half-inflated. (There are a lot of twists in this one.) I make two equal bubbles and join/lock them together. I then make two more bubbles the same size as the previous ones and join them to the first ones using the nozzle. The bubbles should look like a little pumpkin.

Get an orange balloon and work on the beak. First you make the cheeks with two small-ish flower twists. Then one big loop back in the middle between the two cheeks. Connect the beak to the head.

Now typically, you are supposed to carry on from the head using the same balloon, but I was using a scrap for the head, so I used a new balloon. I made a pinch twist in the back of the head to stabilize it, then a bubble for the neck. This was followed by a bird twist which is three longer equal-sized bubbles where one of the bubbles is pushed through between the other to and that holds it in place. In the bird twist was a pinch twist inserted by the neck. I also inserted a tail with three bubbles at the bottom.

A small blue balloon was partially inflated. It was attached at the pinch twist at the neck, twisted around the tail, then connected back at the neck. This was supposed to represent water, but to me it looked like an inner tube that the duck was using. I dunno. Here's the picture of the result:

I also made a few rose buds.They are made with three pinch twists at the top followed by the bird twist. Cut off the remaining balloon. To make the stem, you blow up your green balloon. Put five or six pinch twists at the nozzle end. If the balloon is not tight at the other end, you can insert leaves by making two flower twists. Voila!

Obviously in this example, I had some extra space in the green balloons, hence the leaves.

The heart is simple, but it's still necessary to be careful when making it. It is easily made lopsided. Anyway, after fully inflating a balloon, I make one-inch bubbles on either end and joined them. They made the point of the heart and I molded the point for where the two arcs meet at the top. To dress up the heart a little bit, I stuck two of the rosebuds in the heart. Here's what it looked like:

This is for the Birds

Thursday Yesterday, I had promised Micah a penguin. I didn't make the time to learn one, so I did today. But first I learned how to make a parrot. I really love what you can do by learning on YouTube. I guess you could almost call it YouTube U. Anyway, here are the parrot and penguin that I made.

Good things come in threes

You know the story of the three little pigs, three billy goats gruff, the three musketeers. Hey, I even have triplets. Well, on Wednesday (I skipped Monday and Tuesday) I made three of each of these characters. To practice my tulip twist, I made three pigs. Here they are:

Then I practiced my successive bubbles and learned to make a lion. The lions are cute, and I made three of them too. Here they are in their natural habitat:

Weakend Princess.

My husband bought Ken Stillman's DVD on making princesses. It was very inspiring, but I didn't have the right balloons. Also, his princess was almost life sized. I only had 260's and 6 inch heart shaped balloons. So I decided I would make do with what I had and make a princess out of those balloons. I must tell you, not all princesses are beautiful. This one was ugly. Take a look:

Despite the modest pose and the amount of time it took to make her, she is still no prize for a prince. I believe when I have the right materials, I will be making a more beautiful sculpture. Until then, this is my ugly princess.

Plane stuff

Okay, so I'm playing catch up. I went with the boys to an air show in Lakeland where we saw the Blue Angels. I though, hey, this is a good idea. I could do balloons at an airshow! I figured it might be important to know how to make an airplane. So I went home, and learned how to make an airplane from a few balloons. The video on Youtube showed how to make one with a teddy bear, and I did that, but the balloon was so tight that I kept popping it, and it looked better without anything. It worked well on a hat. This was done on Friday. No photos of planes though. It was a single prop plane and used three balloons. One for the wings, one for the body, and one for the propeller. Hat was an extra balloon.