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rkr4cds Oct 4, 2008

My Dad's 95th B'day is next Friday; the problem is that I'm in the Chicago area and he's 1700 miles away in the Phoenix area. I cannot send flowers/balloons/etc, anything that involves another person following up on getting the presentation finalized.

I thought it would be easy peazy to find very large (18" - 24") sparkly numerals of a 9 and a 5, which could be taped to the wall (he's pretty much bed-bound) so they'd be in eyesight of Dad when he's awake.

  But... NO.

The best I could come up with is silver Mylar balloons. They are the helium-type (they won't be filled, just displayed flat, taped to the wall)

My problem is that they are silver and everyone in AZ decorates in earth tones. These are not going to show up very well against an earth-toned adobe-looking plastered wall.

The mylar numerals are 36" when flat (uninflated) so I'm going to paint a border of at least 3" of red and blue around the edges so they are high contrast.

But they will need to be folded back up to be mailed.

At the art supply shop that I frequent, I asked what type of paint I should use, that won't flake off when the get folded and won't make the balloons stick together when touching in the envelope. 
I bought Liquitex Glossies paints. I've used this before but just in a place where I wanted a deep shiny glossy surface. These give directions about heat setting/baking and I'm worried about the paint not behaving itself without heat setting, on the trip through the postal system, before they're hung in Dad's room.

Will this paint do OK? I'm almost too late to ask, as I've got grandies helping to paint tomorrow morning and I just now thought about double checking with the best Resource List in the world, my TT friends!!!

Will I need to delay this project until I can get something else at the shops on Monday and express it out to AZ on Tues or Wed????

S O S     and   HELP!!!
(and I'd still be open to knowing if there are very large sparkly numerals somewhere like a Hallmark shop or a Dollar shop...)

THANKS!!!

Donna Oct 4, 2008

I'm not any help to you with the paint situation but the first thing that came to my mind was to put a border on them using bright colored electrical tape.  It shouldn't be a problem with folding etc.  Might not be as much fun for the grands as painting would be.
Good Luck,
Donna

rkr4cds Oct 5, 2008

HHHhhmmmmm - I thought of some type of tape, Donna, but also wondered about all of those curves on the 5; the 9 is ALL curves!!
Mylar is like tissue paper - I figure I'll really get it screwed up if I try to apply tape to it.

Thx SO much for jumping in though - it's SO appreciated that you put your Thinking Cap on for me!

B

chrissibrinkley Oct 5, 2008

I'm not sure about the paint on mylar but did have an idea for what your were originally going for. Not trying to shift gears on yah    but what about using poster board, glue and glitter to get that giant sparkly look ....OR...if glitter is a problem with it getting everywhere what about posterboard, glue and that metallic foil gift wrap stuff. You could cut out the numbers however you what them (what font you like) and glue the foil/glitter to it.  I have a local party store that sells all of this stuff, might be easy to fold up pretty thin too. 

Hope all works out for you and happy birthday to your dad

rkr4cds Oct 5, 2008

THx Chrissi...  I'm weighing my options here... it depends partially on how well the 10 yo does with the paint brush in the morning! He's a pretty good cartoonist - very detailed, like his Dad was, so I'm giving him the job.
Perhaps the 6 yo can make the cascading curling ribbons and tie them onto the bottoms!
I don't think the Dad's caretaking family would appreciate the sparkle!

B

rkr4cds Oct 5, 2008

In the end, we found that the paint just beaded up! We switched to markers and paint-filled markers. These are 36" WHEN FILLED! and go completely across our 48" table when flat. The boys and I colored the borders and centers of one, the 9 - that's about all the concentration 2 fellows have. I'll do the number 5 later today. It certainly was a different type of Art project!