One of our favourite charities – Ronald McDonald House in Birmingham – celebrated its third birthday on Tuesday 27th November 2012.

Found this whilst browsing the internet; it was captioned ‘Fruit Balloons Make Me Smile’, they certainly make us smile! It’s nice to see other people doing quirky things with balloons!

We provided some Giant balloons on half-Columns for Sandwell College’s stand at The Skills Show at the NEC, November 2012. Pride of place on the stand went to a Suzuki-engined grass racer, built by a member of staff.

This Sunday saw the Skyride come to Birmingham. 18,000 cyclists took to the streets on a circuit of roads closed especially for the occasion. This gave us slight problems with a delivery to The Botanical Gardens for a 50th Anniversary party, but that was a small price to pay as we were also commissioned to provide some balloon decor for the start area at the University. And yes, that’s Olympic gold-medallist Laura signing hi-viz bibs at the event!

One of our jobs this weekend was to provide balloon décor at a wedding at The Granary, Shenstone. It’s the first time we have visited this venue, and what a fine venue it is, too.

The décor we provided was unusual in that it was all AIR-FILLED, which, in these times of worldwide helium shortages, is great to achieve. We supplied a balloon Bride and Groom, an Exploder which hung from the ceiling, and a Champagne Bottle Arch.

There are definite problems with helium supply, but we would like to stress to all our booked-in customers that we have sufficient for our needs. It may well be more problematic in the future, but we are a creative team and we know we can design viable alternatives. Indeed, the décor shown on the ‘Highbury’ venue page of our website is all air-filled, as helium-filled décor is not allowed there.

The world of balloon venue décor is undoubtedly changing, but we’re well equipped to adapt and we see ourselves as ‘staying ahead of the game’ thanks to our design capabilities.

Wow, that was a busy weekend…

We had Queen Elizabeth and Prince Philip Character Greeters on display in the Council House, balloon decor on display in the Waterhall Gallery and our Morris J-type van (made in Birmingham in 1959) outside in Victoria Square. Somehow we also managed to fit in wedding work and taking Abi to do balloon modelling for the children at The Ronald McDonald House Jubilee Party. Anyone not aware of the fantastic work that the charity does should visit http://www.rmhc.org.uk/where/rmhc_houses/birmingham_childrens, it’s a fantastic set-up which we’re happy to support in any way we can.

We have a brand new Facebook page which is available for anyone to view at www.facebook.com/huffpuffballoons

Hope you ‘Like’ it!

The Royal Wedding in balloons by all at Huff, Puff and Away!

With many thanks to Civic Catering staff at Birmingham City Council House for allowing us to do this photo shoot, now a ‘theme’.

We were able to get coverage on BBC Midlands Today! Bez was interviewed By Ben Sidwell of BBC Midlands at Highbury, the clip was only up for a day or two, but we have some screenshots of all the best bits!

So many thanks are in order;

-To the Civic Catering staff at Birmingham City Council House for letting use do a photoshoot in the first place!

-To the Civic Catering staff at Highbury for letting the BBC film us there.

-To BBC Midlands for featuring us in their Royal Wedding coverage!

Well done the Blues! To celebrate Birmingham City winning the Carling Cup, we dropped a ‘Blues footballer Greeter’ in to our friends at Radio WM, who’d done a great job with match commentary and follow-up. Our Character could be seen on the WM webcam for the duration of Phil Upton’s show.

We’ve really enjoyed being on Radio WM for the past week. We were on Danny Kelly’s afternoon show in a little competition they run called ‘Workplace Challenge’ were we went head to head against Crafty Corner in Bearwood. No prizes involved, just the free publicity of being on the radio twice a day for five days and having Huff, Puff and Away! mentioned. As Bez said at the end of the competition both businesses were winners in the end, even though we were the champs!

If anyone reading this did find us and our website through hearing about us on the show, please let us know!

Abi