Going Up!

Solar hot air balloon lifts off from the back yard today.

Three simple ingredients. Black bags from the dollar store. .5 mil or thinner    

Cut the ends off of four garbage bags.

Find the fold and slice the sides open.

Tape the panels together and fold in half.

Tape the two short sides.

To shape the balloon bring the two side seams together and refold the open end.  

Now tape closed.

Make a 10-15" opening by slicing off  a corner.  Reinforce the edge with tape.

Make a harness by layering two layers of tape together.  

Add a third layer leaving an overlapping sticky edge to attach to the balloon.

Tape  where the bridle attaches to reinforce.

Tie your string to the bridle.

Inflate your balloon with a fan or a hair dryer.

Do this outside or you won't fit out the door.

 Tie on the fishing line.
Set your balloon outside in the sun

And watch it rise up

 and up

 up

and away.

More about solar hot air balloons here.

Tutorial here

  

How to Add a Grab Button to Your Sidebar

Every once in a while I get bored with my blog design and start tinkering with it.  This is a scary proposition because I've had the old design for nearly a year now and once things start changing, there's really no turning back. Goodbye old blog design. Been nice knowing you.  
As it turned out, I decided I just couldn't let go of the black background. So I added a new header.  And while I was at it I designed a grab button and added it to my sidebar. Don't know what a grab bar is? Like a blog roll, a grab button is a colorful way to link to your favorite blogs. It's a square badge with a little bit of computer code in a text box underneath it.
  
Here's how to add a grab button to your Blogger blog.


Locate the HTML code in the text box under the button in the sidebar. Copy it. (Ctrl C)
Go into your blog and click on the "design" tab.
Select Add Gadget
Select add HTML/Javascript
Paste code (Ctrl V) in the text field
Hit Save 


The link will appear in your sidebar.  That's all there is to it.  You're ready start sharing the link love.