Top Picks for Enchanted Woodland Theme

18" ‟Birthday Party Fox

37" ‟Enchanted Tree in Bloom” Microfoil^®  balloon.

18" ‟Birthday Banner Garden” balloon.

Have you seen the new Woodland trend? It is adorable! And there are a lot of new balloons in the Qualatex 2016 catalogue to work on this theme. It is great for birthdays or baby showers. And just in time to welcome spring! I think we will have so much fun with this lovely new theme. I am looking forward to seeing so many great designs using them!

"Fabulous Fox" balloon available 
in both 14" and 33".

Here are some other fabulous new balloons that will work well for this theme.

11" ‟Garden & Butterflies” Festive Assortment.

18" ‟Welcome Baby Banner Garden.”

18" ‟Welcome Little Fox & Friend.”

11" ‟Woodland Foliage-A-Round.”

Please note that not all balloons are available in all countries. Please check with your local distributor.

In the next few days I will be posting part  2 of this blog - Creating a woodland-themed window or decor with some lovely balloon creatures! Showing you some great design ideas using this wonderful new range of balloons!

Happy Ballooning!

Sue
www.suebowler.com

Happy Easter — Rabbits, flowers, and chicks!

Eggs and chicks, like rabbits and hares, are synonymous with Easter. This dates back to Pagan times when eggs were considered a sign of fertility and new life. The early Christians adopted this symbolism because it helped them remember the Resurrection and having new life through Jesus.




As a small child, I remember decorating and painting hard boiled eggs, then rolling them down a hill on Easter Sunday; the first egg to reach the bottom without breaking was the winner! Today, we still enjoy Easter traditions as a family, including an Easter egg hunt (chocolate eggs, of course) and everyone really enjoys the excitement of hunting for eggs.

In the past I have made a few different designs that would work well for Easter. I love the Easter colour palettes, especially Yellow, Spring Lilac, Rose, and Lime Green as it is a great reminder that spring is on its way!

11" "Easter Bunnies & Daisies"

I made this cute rabbit in 2010! The body was made using a 20" Qualatex^® Deco Bubble, filled with under-inflated 11" ‟Big Polka Dot” to represent Easter eggs.

The head of the rabbit was made using a distortion technique. If you would like to learn how to make the head, click HERE for a direct link to the post I wrote about distortion.

How about spring flowers? I thought that these would work well for spring and Easter decor.

I loved making this flower. It was very different from other styles of giant flowers that I had made before. I liked the fact that the head of the flower tips over rather than facing forward. This flower stood approximately 5' (1.5m) tall.

This flower design was made using 27" and 13" ‟Taper Green Leaf” Microfoil balloons and the 11" Green Rainbow SuperAgate^® and the 11" Yellow Orange Rainbow SuperAgate latex balloons.

This flower stood approximately 7' (2m) tall.

18" ‟Baby Chick” Microfoil Balloon.

As soon as I saw the new 18" Baby Chick Microfoil balloon, I knew exactly what I wanted to make with it ‑ a baby chick of course! This lovely simple design can made in just a few minutes, and by

18" ‟Happy Easter Hatched Chicks.”

adding a helium-filled Easter balloon bouquet you can really add value the cutest Easter design.

Material List:

4 - 11" Orange latex balloons
4 - 5" Yellow latex balloons
1 - 12" Yellow Quick Link Balloon™
2 - 160Q Orange
1 - 18" ‟Baby Chick” Microfoil balloon.

Scraps for attaching
Ribbon
Weight for base

Here are a few more ideas that you could use for Easter or spring decor and some of my favourite balloon assortments!


I love this ‟Breezy Butterfly Delight” design. It looks amazing with the 44" ‟Luminous Butterfly” as a topper for this ‟Big Polka Dots” Quick Link column.

11" ‟Big Polka Dots” - Assorted Spring Lilac, Rose, Goldenrod, Lime Green, and Robin's Egg Blue.

11" ‟Big Polka Dots Colourful Assortment”. 

11" ‟Daisies & Butterflies.”

Easter is such a lovely time of the year. Spring arrives along with so many beautiful, vibrant colours!


Happy ballooning!

Sue
www.suebowler.com

Star Struck Air-Filled Balloon Decor for an Awards Ceremony

Many of us decorate award ceremonies or themed events (e.g., “Hollywood Nights”). I recently decorated an awards ceremony in London.  My brief was to create decor that offered big impact and strictly air-filled. It needed to be elegant and use the colours Gold & Black.

Stars, of course are the perfect choice for an event such as this! 
I also needed to use bases and poles to give me a height for my air-filled decor, but I did not want to build a traditional style column. 

I like to start my designing process on my computer first.This allows me to play around with ideas, and once I have a design (or designs) that I am happy with, I can use these images to send to my client for their approval. 

Designing on your computer is pretty easy, and in most cases, it does not require special software if it as simple as my designs.

I wrote a blog "As a Balloon Artist, how can we find our inspiration?". - in this post it gives a brief introduction on how you can create simple designs working on your computer.

Celebrating St. Patrick's Day with Balloons!

Thursday 17th of March is St. Patrick's Day, celebrated by many around the world.

I remember when we used to attend the International Balloon Arts Convention (IBAC) in Chicago. Each year we would visit the city to see the Chicago River turn green. What a truly awesome sight!

So with that in mind, here are a few ideas that are perfect for St. Patrick's Day celebrations.

Think pink and sparkly! Introducing our new "Sparkle" range! February 2016

When I was asked to design and create a "pink" window display for Qualatex^® at the Spring Fair trade show at the NEC in Birmingham, U.K. I was extremely happy! Happy that I would be working with the new Pink Starburst Sparkle and Birthday Sparkle range, but also very happy that I would have the opportunity to add some exciting "sparkly" elements to the displays, too!

18 Pink Starburst Sparkle Bubble Balloon
#43122
U.S. Patent No. 6,782,675

The window space for each of the displays is quite limited, allowing on this occasion enough room for three focal displays. Working with the theme "celebration," I decided to feature age eighteen as the milestone age.

Risk Assessments & Method Statements

I hope like me, you are now starting to take bookings for corporate events for later in the year! With more of us working with corporate clients and in public spaces, I felt that it might be helpful to talk about Risk Assessments and Method Statements. 

It is becoming standard practice for a venue to ask event vendors to provide risk assessments along with proof of their business liability insurance prior to working in a venue, without either of these they will not permit you to work.

So what exactly is a Risk Assessment? In simplest terms, a risk assessment is a systematic process of evaluating the potential risks that may be involved in a projected activity or undertaking. 

Whereas a Method Statement is a document detailing how a particular task or activity will be carried out. It should detail the possible dangers/risks associated with your particular part of the project and the methods of control to be established, to show how the work will be managed safely. 

This all sounds pretty complex, like it's something that would only apply to industrial type businesses. However, in today's world of stricter health and safety laws, there are often requirements for us as event decorators to produce these documents.

14 Day Countdown to Valentine's Day - are you ready?

Now is the time when most people start to think about what they are going to buy or send for Valentine's Day. Many leave it to the very last minute! I remember receiving telephone calls on the actual day asking me to deliver a balloon arrangement and pleading with me not to tell the recipient that they had only just placed the order! 







If you have a balloon shop or store, then I assume that your windows are packed with a fantastic range of beautiful balloon displays and all the items that you are hoping to sell! The next few days is the perfect opportunity to make sure that all the balloons are looking fresh and well- presented. How about your other shop window? Your website? I have noticed that many balloon companies do not refresh or update their homepage very regularly. If I was looking for Valentine's balloons via the internet, I would want to find them quickly and easily on a website. The same applies for your Business Facebook page, too. Do you have a Valentine's cover at the top of your page? 

Creating your own cover for your Facebook page is easy. I wrote a blog a few years ago called,

How to create your own Facebook cover photo using PicMonkey Photo Editor. It guides you through the simple process, and it's free!

U.S. Patent No. 6,782,675

Think Pink! Is a top tip from Tope Abulude, CBA, of Balloon Inspirations, in Essex U.K. 

"I use as much pink as I do red, and air-filled Qualatex^® Deco Bubbles... Simply so I can immediately convert my designs to Mother's Day as soon as Valentine's Day is done. I guess for me it's being able to create arrangements that I can still sell after Valentine's."