Balloon umbrella

Materials: balloons, scissors, an air pump.

Buy balloons on Amazon (paid link): 

https://amzn.to/3ghxhW6

 Buy an air pump on Amazon (paid link): 

https://amzn.to/3mW1DyJ

We are going to make an umbrella in the same fashion as described in previously published instruction Fabric 8, Surfboard, Skateboard, Basket and etc. We are going to use more balloons though. Inflate five balloons leaving about three-inch flat tail (Pic 1).

Keep in mind that there are different ways to start this sculpture. Twist the first blue up to one-inch bubble. Lock the free end of the first blue bubble with the nozzle of the second (yellow) balloon. Twist the first yellow bubble (Pic 2).

Proceed in the same fashion making a chain of five bubbles. Lock the free end of a bubble with the nozzle of the next balloon and twist the first bubble of this balloon (pic 3).

Lock the free end of the first bubble of the last balloon with nozzle of the first balloon (Pic 4). We have made the top of the umbrella or the first row.

Now we are going to make the second row. We can start twisting bubbles from any balloon. Twist the second yellow up to one-inch bubble. Twist the third yellow about three-inch bubble. For purpose of this instruction I will call this bubble a Large bubble. The size of all large bubbles in the same row should be the same. And it could vary depending on the shape of the sculpture we are making. Twist the second blue bubble of the nearest balloon (Pic 5).

Lock the free end of the second blue bubble with the free end of the third yellow bubble. Work in this direction around the center of the sculpture in this fashion (Pic 6).

Lock the free end of the third blue bubble of the last balloon between the second and the third yellow bubbles (Pic 7). We have made the second row.

To make this sculpture, I give about two-inch increase of the size of large bubbles in each row. So, twist the fourth yellow about one-inch bubble. Twist the fifth yellow about five-inch bubble. Twist the fourth blue about one-inch bubble of the next nearest balloon (Pic 8).

Work in the same direction in this fashion around the center to make the third row (Pic 9).

We work entire row in the same direction. However, we can work each row in different directions. In this example I work the first three rows clockwise. And now I am going to work rest of the sculpture in counterclockwise direction (Pic 10 and 11). 

Work the rest of the sculpture in this fashion to make total of six rows (Pic 12 through 15). Also, we can finish the sculpture at any time. Just cut off the rest of the balloons and tie off the ends. We can add new balloons to make a very large size sculpture. We can use this sculpture as a roof. We can turn the sculpture upside down and use it as a bowl, plate, vase and etc.

I am going to use a simple sword as a handle for our umbrella (Pic 16).

Just force the tip of the sword through the loop of first row bubbles at the center of the sculpture (Pic 17 and 18). Congratulations, we have made the umbrella.

There are many different color patterns we can make. In this example I used five different color balloons and work every row in the same direction (Pic 19 through 22).

The shape of the sculpture allowed us to push every other row in and out to make a shallow or flat sculpture (Pic 23 through 25). Also, in this example I work every other row in opposite direction to make different color pattern.

We can always fix the rows back to make the umbrella (Pic 26 and 27).

So far we have worked with five balloons to make each sculpture using different color pattern (Pic 28).

We can apply the same technique to make sculptures using any number of balloons. Here is an example of sculpture with four balloons. To make this sculpture you have to tie together nuzzles of all four balloons in  one knot. Also, in this example I have decrease size of the large bubbles in the last three rows to make a diamond shape (Pic 29 through 31). There are total of seven rows.

The list of color patterns and variations of shapes is endless (pic 32). Have fun and happy twisting :)