First, let me wish you a Happy New Year.  I hope you and yours are doing well.

New Balloon Design
Wellit has been a while since I picked up a balloon and started twistingsomething. Therefore, I decided to give myself a little challenge.  Themovie Avatar is the big talk so I went online and found a photograph ofthe main character Jack Sully and using what balloons I had in myballoon apron tried to recreated the character.

Why did I dothis?  Well I know in the next couple of weeks I will get somebodyrequesting this character and having done it once will give me a betterchance to impress them with my skills.  Plus I was in the mood to twistballoons. It dŒs not happen that often -- working on my 26th year ofballoon twisting this April.

The Avatar charactertook about 20 minutes to create and I did not spend that much timeresearching all the details, just enough to give an idea what thecharacter looked liked. I feel it's a good representation of thecharacter for just 20 mintues of research and twisting.

Dale is predicting...
I did make a prediction for the 2010 entertainment season.  So for all you entertainers out there, give me your thoughts on what you expect in 2010?

Are you Looking to make extra income 2010€¦.
Find out how you can accomplish this with very little effort.

Store Improvement
If you're a Facebook friend, you would have read my stats last night€¦ Excellent night of computer coding and jammin to the radio.  I have nearly compleated of a quick order form which will make it easier for entertainers to purchase balloons. I hope to release the URL sometime next week.  So keep your eyes open for next weeks update notice.
Isit time to replace that old dysfunctional balloon apron if yours?  Thencheckout the Deluxe Balloon Apron and see how it can help you become abetter balloon entertainer.

Booking a Party?
Wellhave you booked me for a party yet?  Have you hired me for yourcorprate event?  Would love to see all my readers face-to-face.  Giveme a call and book your next event with Magical Balloon-dude Dale...708.744.0234

If you're looking to see some great balloon work, checkout this months posting of Experience the Thrill of being Balloon Artist this Holiday Season.I made a great looking snowman and Rudolf for this article.  Thearticle is about what it is like to be a balloona artist or corporateentertainer. Every entertainer whats to get into corproateentertaining, but see for yourself what it is like to be a corproateentertainer on the road.  Here is a what happend to me this past December weekend.

Please leave feel free to leave a comment.  Love to hear from you all.

How to Get More Corproate Gigs

If you been following Dale's Blog you would have learned that Corporate Entertainer Barry Friedman gave 10 articles on how to get more corporate gigs.  Starting in 2010 Barry will be expanding his online training program www.GetMoreCorporateGigs.com/TrainingCourseand is working to incorproate more entertainment fields.  Many of Barrytechiques can be used in other areas of entertainment.  

Nowthe information provided in this free training course can help not onlyentertainers, but any person who is looking to expand their businessmarketing knowledge.  The ideas presented are not specifically"entertainment only" ideas, but sold business marketing concepts thatwith a little tweeking can be valuable to any person who is inbusiness.  This is a free class, which I've taken.  When you registerfor the class, you will recievce an email from Barry, click on the linkand it will link you to a short educational slideshow video.  It's thatsimple.  I hope you take the time to give Barry a chance to educate youand help you grow your business.

It'shard to believe that this year is rapedly coming to an end.  I havegone through some presonal things this year, the loss of my mother inMay to the birth of my second child in June.  Like most businesses, Iam working extra hard in these trying economic to keep improving and tokeep employeed.  This year I was able to post 198 articles in Dale's Blogwhich I hope you found interesting, funny, educational and thoughtprovoking.  Michelle and I have been working on improving and getingmore balloon DVD's and balloon supplies, and making it easier for you to shop at the mdb2.com store.

The mbd2.com article sectionhas been constently updated with new articles, which many have now beenarchieved allowing space for new 2010 information. If you like to writeI'm always looking for writers to contribute articles. The mbd2.com forum is still growing with information and entertainers are constanly joining.  I hope that you'll make a donation to the forum to help keep it going.

This is be the last update notice for 2009 so Happy Holidays  and have a great New Year.

From Dale
AKA. Magical Balloon-dude Dale

P.S.  Don't forget to checkout the newest DVD's

I have been recently working with some new video editing software and put together a video presentation on youtube called Balloon Artist. I'm showing off my talent not only as a balloon entertainer (a personwho makes multiple balloon animal sculptures), but as a balloonartist.  My personal definition of a balloon artist is a person who isa very creative and is willing spend an extensive amount of timebuilding a balloon sculpture.   When I say extensive, I'm taking hoursto build a design.

In the video, I try to use my best artisticskills and create a video that would be fun to watch and would amazethe average audience member.  I choose Maple Leaf Rag as the audiofile, because it was an upbeat melody and plus I like it.

I did try a free on-line software company, but wasn't impressed with it as much.  Since your my fans, why not show you the first Balloon Artist video I made.

Ipersonally like the second video on YouTube, but feel free to shareboth, if you like.  I know my family and friends like to watch a goodvideo ;-)
 

Thisis a fun article - Topic is serious, but the story is funny.  If youdon't understand why there are less parties... over the past few yearsthe holiday parties are becoming so politically correct that fewer andfewer companies are having them.  Not only are the parties becomingdifficult to plan, but the bad economy isn't helping.  Read what HR isgoing through to get the perfect holiday party.
 

Amidstall the holiday shopping craziness, most Americans at this time of yearwant to see holiday signs that wish them a "Merry Christmas."

Anew Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 72% ofadults prefer "Merry Christmas," while 22% like "Happy Holidays"instead.

Older Americans favor "Merry Christmas" more than younger adults. 

Datafromhttp://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/lifestyle/holidays/november_2009/most_americans_prefer_merry_christmas_to_happy_holidays

Planning For Kids Birthday Parties

Likemany people who have a website I am always working on new ways toincrease traffic and build my business.  But lately, I have noticed atrend that people are steering away form successful web ranking toolsand going with social networks like Facebook that don't help withGoogle ranking.  We all want to be the first on Google's search list,but to often people don't understand what you need to accomplish this. 

Just recently, I was reading an industry magazine article abouthow you need to Twitter and Facebook.  The article made it sound likeall you need to do was start a Facebook page and Twitter that you haveit and people will come flooding to your website.  Well here is whatthe Guru's are not telling you.

What Everybody Ought to Know About Building a Balloon Show

Did you Buy Old Tire?

I received an email from my sister about tire safety, that old tiresare being sold as new.  This bothered me because I do a lot of drivingand buy new tires regularly.  If you were like me, you didn't know thattires have a shelf life.  Duh!  Its rubber and rubber dŒs breakdownover time.  You think a guy who works with rubber balloons and promotesthat a twisting balloon is biodegradable would know better, but I didn't. 

Theproblem comes about when the tire rubber dries out and the threads tearoff the tire.  This causes the car to skid, making the car veer in manydirections.  Tire manufactures do place a code on the inside of thetire to denote when the tire was made.  The code is not hard to read. The first number is the manufactured date, followed by the year.  12303would translate too - 123 day in 2003 the tire was made.  If the tirehas been sitting on the shelf for 6 years its not new.  So that newtire you just installed is 6 years old.  I know balloon entertainerswho would not buy 6 year old balloons because of fear of failure.

Here is a link to the video - its about 6 minutes long, but educational. 

I just want everyone to be safe as they travel this holiday season.

 
Its not Spam, it me!
Eachupdate notice will on contain two topics, so the updates will be short,to the point, and an easy read if your viewing on a mobile phone.  Asalways I will start the message with the word balloon so you now itsnot spam email.

Overthe past 12 years my update notice has grown to over 4,000 subscribersand now with the list so big I have to move to a professional emailservice.  I've wasn't able to send you an update about the 100 Articlesin October because the volume of emails being sent from my serviceprovider was shutting down his server plus, with the large volume ofemail it was starting to look like a spammer to Yahoo email.  Didn'twant that, so I opted to use a professional email service.  I hope youlike the new look and the fact that I can keep you abreast of myactivities, products, and activies going on in the balloonentertainment community.

Each update notice will contain twotopics, so the updates will be short, to the point, and an easy read ifyour viewing on a mobile phone.  As always I will start the messagewith the word balloon so you now its not spam email.