02.27.10
Posted in Balloon Blogs at 11:55 am by Super K
A Flower to call her own
Well, I just subscribed to my first blog- A fellow Newbie Balloon Twister that wants to work his way through a DVD Ala “Julie and Julia”- I like the idea and I would do it to except he’s doing it first and I am no Copy Cat- Well, I do Balloons, so I guess I am. WHat? Hmmm….I learn other peoples twisted items, use them for my clients so I guess that is exactly what I am. Dang it! A Copy Cat is something every 4 year old knows you are not supposed to be! I guess I’ll have to figure out how to something that is just me.
Well, I do have a twist that is just mine- The April’s Flower! That’s mine! I came up with a twist on the woven flower at a Jam a while ago, named it for the Waitress (I am not PC and the “Server”s here in California can actually end up being the guy that clears the tables! – Makes me wonder if they wash their hands!- Food service and Latex gloves should be NEVER be together and I’d tell you why they are not a good combo but that is for another blog entry!) Anyway, she asked for a different kind of Flower, so I did the six petal woven flower– the one that if turned upside down can double as a monkey skirt? Okay, I then pull the weave extra tight and up towards the top, grasped the inner 6 balloons and twisted about 6″ up forming a stalk of sorts. This leaves the woven flower smaller, but intact and high on the flower. The outer 6 balloons are now large loops all heading in the same direction. I give the whole thing a good snug twist to collapse the flower onto itself- this sets a curve to it once its fluffed out again– and add a contrasting Stamen/pistil unit on the inside of the woven flower, a green stem and Viola!. Instructions are available- Jet me out an email and I’ll send them to you Free!- Superk@airborncreations.net
Till next time- happy Twisting!
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03.04.10
Posted in Marketing at 12:38 am by JoAnn Balloons
Well, the first week of March and after a huge February (for us) March is looking like Old Mother Hubbard’s Cupboard. What to do?, What to do?
“To market, to market, to buy a fat pig,
Home again, home again, dancing a jig;…” Mother Goose
I guess it’s time to market. But to find Clients,where best to put the meager pennies I have to spend? I subscribe to a verygood site where a guy that entertains, also runs a marketing site. He is wonderful- most of my friends swear by him and the advice I have gleaned off his newsletter have been fruitful in the past. You should check him out: “John Abram’s-Rebel Entertainer Series” The web site is here- http://rebelentertainer.blogspot.com/2010/03/best-school-assembly-themes.html and this weeks topic is a new chapter in the continuing Saga for us newbies looking to stretch our marketing dollar. Like everyone else you can follow him on most of the social outlets, but his insights are great- Not saying this to plug his system, it’s because I also know that since he is a working entertainer that also has to market for work, it is stuff that has worked for him. Sharing leads, techniques and soul is what balloon people do.
Tomorrow I have on my schedule to call a web SEO and Marketer that said she will take a look at my site and get me up and running with the big dogs. I am also looking to move my Party Pop listing up to page one somehow. Not sure though, since I am buried on page 6 right now. I’ll keep you posted!
I am also looking to have as many of you out there Vote for a friend of mine’s Idea on the Pepsi Site! It’s a great project that entails local Balloon Artists building a huge walk around exhibit that is a life sized replica for the Jurassic Period animals- YES Latex Dinosaurs in a Mall near you! If it gets funding, this is a wonderful way for the public to ‘Bone up’ on their Dinosaurs and their respect for what can be done with Balloons.Their not just for floating anymore Virginia! Anyway, drop by the Pepsi site: you will find the site, our project and how to vote here: Elastic Park: unique exhibition blending art, pre-history & community | Pepsi Refresh Everything Click and follow the directions, its easy and its Free!
Speaking of Projects- I am working on a Hush Hush project for a couple of months out- Hope that we get it, it will be fantastic for the local community, our business, and our egos. (Ego is too a valid reason to do a project) I should know in a day or two whether we got it or not, I’ll Blog when I get out of the fog, so till then, have a good week all, and Happy Twisting!
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02.24.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 2:19 am by Super K
Wow, what a ride! I just got home from, for me, a marathon plane ride. From Kenosha to Milwaulkee (via Lexi’s Generous Taxi Service!) from there, scanned, wanded, patted down, both carry on and checked luggage searched! I expect to be wanded it because I do have a Titanium Rod in my leg from an old Motorcycle accident, but I have never had a bag neither checked nor carried on searched. Odd feeling- but oh, well. its for my safety right? Hummm…. Then into the terminal to sit for the prescribed 2 hours of preflight. From there, my Flight to Baltimore and a 20 minute layover, then off to Denver for another 20minutes, then home to Orange County. Actual time on the plane? I haven’t got a clue! I started at 1:25pm Milwaukee Time, then to the east coast where it was an hour and a half flying time and a one hour time zone loss- then a 5 hour flight to Denver and a loss of 2 more time zone hours, then to OC for one more time zone after 3 1/2 hours of flight time. So total = ? Again, who knows? I felt like it was two days! And when I was picked up, just to add to the wonderful excursion, my sweet girlfriend pulls up in her Mercedes (the luggage fit on the drop off!) with a trunk full of Face painting gear- turns out she thought she’d cleared the trunk after the gig on the Saturday before. – Oh, well, a quick 40 minute round trip to drop off one bag of mine and the face painting gear, then back for me. I was whooped.
Though thouroughly tired, it was a hugely successful trip- I not only got to visit my Grandchildren, got to teach my Maddie a few new twists, and got to Jam with wonderful friends and show off my Daughter and Son-in-law to them at Twist and Shout, I also was able to do an out of state birthday party to expand the publics awareness of the things we can do with balloons! Happy Birthday Maddie, Emilie, Maya and Lauren!
Huge thanks to : Chris and Lexi for their Hospitality and love, the Grandkids for being themselves, to Miss Sharon and Abba for sharing and extending trust to their daughter’s party entertainment to a far a way stranger and to all the new friends I met at Lexi’s and at the Party! What Wisconsin lacks in temperature, it makes up in friendly open arms. Going back, I will do two things though, 1. Spring! I won’t go back until the snow melts— and 2, a direct flight there and back! One can OD on Peanuts and Pretzels- not a good thing.
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02.11.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 2:04 pm by Super K
Just got a photo of my 6 year old Granddaughter and her balloon dog. She blew up the balloon, Mom tied it, and then she twisted the head, front feet and back feet. A little marker work for the face and viola! Pretty good dog. I am heading out that way, from what we in So Cal consider a cold 59 degrees to a FRIGID 27 (thankfully!) above zero. They are in Kenosha Wisconsin, Home of the Chrysler Engine plant, DJ Elert and the Majiloon Pump, some of the quaintest little restaurants you ever could imagine and my daughters family. I am flying out for a visit and a Birthday Party. I was going to go solo as the balloon artist for the party, but now I see that I either have a cute-able assistant, or a little competition. It’s going to be a great party. I have included the photo so everyone can see what a cutie she is. Yup, takes after her Grandfather.
Look at the Cute Faces!
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02.08.10
Posted in Air Born Product Development at 12:56 am by Super K
Well, there are two. Both in the prototype stage. First is a PVC set of fittings for the numbers 0-9 and the letters A-Z. Special characters could be offered, perhaps even Korean, Chinese or Japanese on request. These are being developed because of the lack of nonstandard height frames. All current choices are 2 foot or 4 foot. Need your letters to be seen from across the football field at a Homecoming? 4 footers aren’t going to cut it. My system will be just the fittings only, the pipe you can still purchase at the depot stores yourself. I would supply the fittings and the material list to put each of the numbers together. A tinker toy set without the dowels!
The next idea is to get my Face painting set up and running. I have a small suit case with paints that are secured in a sponge mat so I just have to close the case lid to cover up the paint. I want that case to fit into a larger case that is self contained and with a single lid, be closed up and ready to hot foot it to the next gig or to just get the heck out of Dodge before the next whining parent comes up and tried to wheedle ”just one more” out of me. There are two things here that irritate me about these parents beside the fact that they are always lying about having stood in line for the last two hours and I that was just ignoring them, the other is: I do hate to say no, and I am not going to set a precedent. I do not want to be the guy they refer to at XYZ’s next gig for the same parent pulling the same line on the new Artist. ” Well, Air Born Did it, you can stay the extra 5 minutes to do my kid too! “ Makes me look bad- I don’t like it.
The new item I am working on is a 12 v closed water system, silicon sealed tubing, one way valves and air top off tanks so that I can come up to a gig, open the lid, push a button, the water fills the cups for painting, if I need to change skanky water, I push a button and the old water is drained into an empty container and new clean water fills the cups again from a jug of fresh water. The only open point of the system is the cup I would rinse the brush in. Once I empty thecup for the last time, I close the lid and I am gone! I am already working on a way to make sure the system stays sanitary- a protocol that will probably entail a thorough bleaching rinse at home after the gigs.
They maybe a couple of hairbrained ideas but I have interest already from a few face painters and decorators.
Happy Twisting!
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02.03.10
Posted in Face Painting at 3:29 am by Super K
The West Coast Face Painters have had their monthly Jam yesterday. It’s held in Montclair at the Panda Gardens Buffet, just off Central. Lily has a great Jam and it was a lot of fun. This is the night that a good friend pushed me off the fence to paint my first item. It was a shamrock, practice for St Patrick’s Day, but a painting nonetheless. As JoAnn put so delicately, I am no longer a face painting virgin. The art was a little shaky, but the kid was a bit impressed. Said I was really good. Hah, he didn’t know the stress I went through as I painted the little green leaf. It really is one thing to talk about learning to face paint and an entirely differnt thing altogether to actually do it. Maybe the fear of failure, or being told that I didn’t do it well enough. Since this is a blog and not a therapy session, I’ll leave the depth out of this for now and say that I got through two more shamrocks, a baby tiger, Daddy Tiger, a magician’s hat, wand, Red then Black Power Ranger, Stars, moon and sun! So I guess JoAnn was right, now I just need lots of experience and practice.
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02.02.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 3:43 am by Super K
Larry Moss is trying to secure funding for his latest project. A huge undertaking, this will invovle lots of people, lots of twisting and lots of balloons. For the full story mosey on over to his site http://airigami.com Basically this is walk on the wild side- Prehistoric wild side that is. In a scalable and flexible museum exhibit type event, this would take the spectators on a walk through time, yup, Dinosaurs in their full Latex Glory. A full sized T-Rex? perhaps, a Velociraptor? , Brontosaur? Pteradon? I don’t know the lineup of animals but I sure hope that it comes to the West Coast for a visit. What Larry needs is funding. I am sure that donations will be accepted through his site- please go there if you want to donate, but he is also asking us to vote-
Pepsi is holding a competition for funding- A whole lot of money, with the top ten vote getters get funding! So Larry also needs us to vote for the project. You can do that by going to http://www.refresheverything.com/ElasticPark once per day and vote. From Feb 1- Hey thats today!- to Feb 28 visit and vote each day. Lets get Larry his funding and get this history project heading in the right direction!
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01.29.10
Posted in Uncategorized at 3:30 pm by Super K
Okay Balloon Fans, here goes nothing. There are two Conventions coming up: Twist and Shout and World Balloon Convention. If there are others I did not mention, feel free to set me straight. I met Patty and Royal Sorrell last year, what a treat. Two of the busiest yet nice people I have seen in a long while. I have yet to meet the Vlamis’ but I understand that they to are very nice people to be around. I am headed to Chicago in three weeks or so, but I am not going to be able to go to most of the T&S convention. I will be there for a few Jams, but I have a scheduled Gig in Kenosha Wisconsin on the 20th and I was thinking two birds, so to speak. I am going to be at the entire WBC event as I am working there! I was extended he honor of the post of gofer- A private in the Conventions army. I will be responsible for , well, nothing- I will betold where to go and what to do once I get there. I am looking forward to working with everyone and meeting every single person there. PLease post below whether you will be ther or not. I will look for you specifically.Now to see if I did this right.
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