Hot Air Balloon

Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta is fabulous. If you go, be sure to stay long enough, as there is always bad weather and cancellations at least once or twice :) Also, if you volunteer to crew a balloon, you get admission tickets to get in free ... and it's so much fun. Anyone can do it, the balloonists always need help. Because I'm short and ... well ... not the most agile, they gave me their cards to hand out, and the job of keeping small (and big) people from stepping over the ropes tethering the balloon. We also helped launch, chase and recover and fold the balloon. Once in a while if you're very very very lucky, a balloonist invites you to jump in and go along; my daughter got to go and so did hubby! Walking in the field amidst 900 balloons filling and launching is indescribable, and it's the only festival in the world where you can do that ... the colors, oh, the colors! And the night glows ... !!! Sometimes we've taken the camper out, and balloons landed right in the campground :)
 
Look at who is out for a hot air balloon ride! Wwweeeee!!!
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I made one with ombre moss aquamarine with blue tourmaline indicolite briolette on the bottom.
The pearl is a bit too small for this basket though so I'm gonna have to get a larger pearl to replace it down the road!
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WOW, Purr!!! They are wonderful!!

The octo baby is too cute. How small is it?
 
Hi Bailey! Yes the octo infant is sssooo adorable! I'm attaching a few pictures here for your reference:

Here is a family shot of Sheri's Octo Babies in various sizes. The one I have dangling from the hot air balloon is the teensiest of the family.
Though I have Octo babies of the 3 smallest sizes. :eek:
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Here are a few pics of the babies on ruler & dime:
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This balloon is made for my sister's birthday, which is waaaaaaaay over due (gasp, late May).
I ordered the parts a while back, but have been mobbed at work and didn't get a chance to complete it until now.

Ordered the 14-15mm Tahitian from Jac, OctoBabies from Sheri, rondelles are multi-color umba sapphires. Initially, I didn't think I was going to get 2, but couldn't make up my mind between silver vs enamel, so ended getting both. :eek:

This is their original shiny silver state, then I asked Sheri to add the tiniest hint of oxidation to one of the octo's belly to highlight the details, and enameled the other one.
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Sheri sent me the cutest picture titled Tandem Flying! Initially I thought I was going to make a regular balloon with just 1 octobaby dangling, and I would keep the 2nd one to myself. But now I have to keep them together in tandem, and I credit Sheri for naming this particular balloon! Thank you Sheri! :eek: Wwwhhhheeeee!!! They are ADORABLE!!! Love how each turned out!
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To be honest, I am having a very hard time letting this one go... and DAMN making balloons is a lot of work! I probably won't be making another one for the rest of the summer. And since this pearl is bigger than the rest of the ones I've used, I used a 5 prong leg basket instead of 4.

A group shot of Tandem with the rest of the hot air balloons before I send them flying off to Taipei to live with my sister~~~
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Those are awesome, Purr! I love the entire balloon collection, they're such fun!
 
I must admit, I'm kind of glad you are keeping the kids together...I'm sure they are excited to be flying in tandem to the other side of the world!
 
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