February 12 - Invisible

I gather the giggles, the gloom and the glory,
Footnote the folks who inspired the story.
I nudge every nozzle and polish each pose,
Then sneak in a pig (because that's how it goes).

And I sit there a moment.
Just me.
Just the quiet.

An invisible clown?

Then I turn out the light.

*click*

November 18 - Hats

"The earth has music for those who listen."

~ George Santayana

He took balloons around the world in the most inspiring way.

Today I'm thankful for Addi Somekh.

Addi is someone who has pushed past perceived boundaries, from his television series to his band to his world travels.  Looking at the images in his book, I'm both awed and inspired.  He's humble, kind, and spreading the love in every way possible.

A modern Johnny Latex-seed.

(view other hats)

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Other balloons by and inspired by Addi Somekh:

December 29 - Boy Tiara's

"What is lovely never dies, but passes into another loveliness, star-dust or sea-foam, flower or winged air."

~ Thomas Bailey Aldrich

This post was in my half-finished-need-to-get-back-to-work-on bucket, but I feel like I need to let it go now.

I pretty much fell off the face of the earth in regards to social media and the balloon world, so it was only a couple days ago that I stumbled across a video that referred to a "Jeff Hayes memorial fund" -- ...   I need a minute ... 

Jeff was indescribable in one word.  Uncanny?  

I first met him in the very beginning of this balloon blog when I attended a Steve Klein seminar, the original host was having technical problems so he stepped in like a boss for one of the most inspiring hours in my early balloon twisting.  When I reached out to him afterward to thank him, we struck up a conversation that went on for months.

Jeff has a knack, no - a super power, of elevating simple ideas to something extra-ordinary.  I believe I have said frequently on this blog that I would try to think about things in a "what would Jeff do?" sort of way.   This is a good example of his brilliance I think.

Original post text:

These tiara's were designed by Jeff "The Uncanny" Hayes and taught at our webinar.  Taking the normal tiara type crown and spicing it up with sticks and snails and puppy dog tails.  Since it's Jeff, I had to try and make it ride a shark and shoot lasers, so I went for a dragon.  Not entirely happy with the result, especially since I didn't put the tongue in for any of the pictures!!  He also showed us a zombie using a similar structure, but with a brain in the belly - guaranteed to make anyone who sees it laugh in ...horror?

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Other balloons by and inspired by the Jeffrey Hayes:

February 10 - Party Hats

“Some hats can only be worn if you're willing to be jaunty, to set them at an angle and to walk beneath them with a spring in your stride as if you're only a step away from dancing. They demand a lot of you.”
~ Neil Gaiman Anansi Boys

I mentioned yesterday that I got a last minute request for balloons at my youngest sons birthday party - we decided on party hats.

I should say thankfully we decided on party hats.  These do not take much time to put together at all, and they are as abstract/pure form creative play with balloons as you can get.

This idea and a few of these designs are from Addi Somekh's website and documents. As great as some of them turned out, I also had some stinkers - since the guests were occupied for most of the hour jumping on trampolines, I had plenty of time to make extras.

What I didn't have time for was doing anything too special with Purple today ...

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Other posts with Addi's designs:


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August 13 - Addi's Hats

"Laughing is the smile of the World."

Weerashon Puttrpadit, Mahasarakham, Thailand

The final official Bling Bling Jam twisting instructor I want to cover is Addi Somekh.  (Sorry decor instructors!)

I left Addi's session inspired to "go and make the world happy with balloons".

Addi and his photographer friend, Charlie Eckert, spent literally years travelling the world creating abstract hats for strangers.  Many of these amazing images you can find on his websites (main link) and in the book/kit they created together "Balloon Hat Kit", but we watched as he showed image upon image of human beings from everywhere imaginable, from a Sadhu sitting and meditating in a loincloth in India, to Norwegian soldiers, to a family BBQ in East LA.

One point he makes is that regardless of divisions we may feel, no matter what dialect we speak, we all laugh in the same language.

He showed us a few basic hat structures from which to build, gave us tips on jazz, what he considers elegant design and use of negative space, but mainly go practice, and that for every great hat design you see in the images, there were more than an equal number of terrible looking ones.

So here is my homework, I kept myself to balloons that were given from the jam - so in some ways I was limited on color.  This is also a fraction of what I made, as I would make 3-4 at a time - some didn't get a picture, some are waiting downstairs at this moment for daylight for pictures.

Thanks Addi!

I've watched Ratatouille, this could work ...

August 1 - Fascinators

The sun did not shine.
It was too wet to play.
So we sat in the house
All that cold, cold, wet day.
I sat there with Sally.
We sat there, we two.
And I said, “How I wish
We had something to do!”

~ Dr. Seuss The Cat in the Hat

I tried practicing some fancy hats today (I'm told they are called "fascinators"). I had first noticed Michael Crayton's stylish headbands at a previous convention but finally got a chance to hang out with him in the jam room.  Michael is not only incredibly artistic, but fun to hang out with and a great guy. He stopped what he was working on to show me a few things in the jam room, even loaning one of his headbands to practice with. I never got a chance to return it because as I was walking through the casino, one of the employees made a sound like OOooOHSOCUTE! Which is kind of like my magic giveaway word.

Though simple in concept, you are building abstract art - a good color sense is a must. My skills lie about on par with someone in a 6th grade art class, so when I grabbed some "balloons", Michael thankfully suggested some good accent colors for those. I built a basic version similar to the one above at the convention, but never really got a chance to play while there.

These hats are displayed in the order that they were built here, as you can imagine - there are a million billion trillion things you could do for variety, I'm barely scraping the surface here, I've only build four of these - remember Bartholomew Cubbins had to pull 500 hats off his head before he had one fit for a king.

Thank you, Michael!

"Fat guy in a Hawaiian shirt on the 4th of July" - working title	Fascinator on a fascinator
I'm a fascinator!  I can do the twist! Can you tell me baby, do you like it like this!?

May 20 - Cake Boss / Cupcake Head

Cake, and grief counseling, will be available at the conclusion of the test.
~ GLaDOS

Wednesday night our youngest spoke those words every parent dreads to hear just as they are saying goodnight.  "I need a costume by Friday."

Usually this is something that his mother handles, she's far more crafty than I am - but after we finally deduced that "Cake Boss" wasn't the TV show guy and was actually some sort of Dick Tracy-type villain with a cake for a head, this seemed to be the easiest answer!

I had seen pictures of gigantic quicklink cupcakes online, and figured I could make a smaller version. It took two attempts to get sizing right, but I'd call it arrrrgh-last-minute-give-me-more-notice-next-time success!

Cupcake²

I volunteered for the sprinkle clean-up crew!

April 30 - Wearables Grab Bag

Ready to form Voltron. Activate interlock.
Dynotherms - connected. Infracells - up.
Megathrusters are go! All form Voltron!
Let's go Voltron Force!

It's the end of April - already a third of the way through the year, I figure it's about time for some spring cleaning.  Every so often I will build something that for some reason or another just doesn't work for it's own blog post.

But together they form into mecha-blog post, capable of restoring peace to the galaxy and defending the Earth against King Zarkon's evil droid armies.

These first two are Jeff Hayes designs from his Seriously Out There DVD.  The brain in a jar is something he taught us as well in a webinar. I really have no idea what to do with headbands...

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This Flower Pot Hairband was taught by David Brenion is Balloon Magic #78. So. Random. This actually could have been a pretty cool post if I had put the effort into making a whole bunch of these and played around with varying the petal colors, but with the flowers being in their own vases it just seemed like a bunch of busy work rather than something exciting to do ... ... and I have no idea what to do with headbands...

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Ryan Lavallee showed us how to make a Pac Man bracelet in Balloon Blast Show season 3 episode 8. He showed us the blue ghost version which I thought would be instantly recognizable ... my kids had no clue.  #bahkidsthesedays  #stayoffmylawn

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Shark Hat by David Brenion - Balloon Magic #80 I love the look of this hat, the sidewall bubble in the front gives a nice pointed nose, and the artwork is so simple yet effective! I know even less of what to do with giant head wearables -- I struggled mostly with this one attempting to get a decent picture and they all pretty much ended up looking exactly like this.

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... rainbow head?  I have no idea what to do wi ... you get the idea.  But I do like how the lights turn each of these into little chubby faces.

March 13 - St. Patrick's Wearables

"May the saddest day of your future be no worse than the happiest day of your past."
   ~ Irish Toast


David Brenion created both of these for Balloon Magic Magazine. 

Issue #63 gave us the Leprechaun bracelet (there is a strap that goes under the beard).  This bracelet had some interesting ideas on getting the top and sides of the hat to bow, and I could see it used for a dapper gentleman or perhaps anyone with a stovepipe-style hat.

In issue #70, David showed us the hairband.  It's a very quick design, accessorize as much as you like after you create a basic structure.  It's hard to get things to both sit right on a hairband and have that hairband sit on a head.  There must be some secret to positioning it that currently eludes me ...

How can you tell if a Leprechauns is having a good time? He's Dublin over in laughter!

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Other St. Patrick's designs:


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