Balloons

The teddy bears have just been to a birthday party for one of their friends. They all had a lovely time, had yummy food to eat, and big slices of birthday cake and played lots of fun games. There were brilliant sparklers, colourful confetti and bright balloons all around the room.

At the end of the night, they were asked if they would like to take some of the balloons home with them. "Yes, please!" they replied, thinking of all the fun they could have with them.

Normally, the teddy bears blow up balloons with big breaths of air, puffing the bears out very quickly! The balloons are too heavy to float away by themselves - even if you throw them up into the air, they soon sink again.

The air we breathe into balloons is squished up so much into the balloon that it gets heavier than the air around it. Plus the material the balloons are made of is quite heavy too. That's why they don't float so well. And it makes them good for playing games like pawball (that's football to other people).

The balloons they brought home, though, are filled with something called helium.

Apparently, it's so much lighter than air that if you let one loose, it would just float up into the sky for ever and ever - the teddy bears think probably even as far as the moon!! The balloons themselves are made of some material that is very light - and looks a bit like tinfoil that has been painted all over in pretty colours! That's why each balloon has a ribbon tied to it, with a weight on the end so that they can't float away!

The teddy bears removed the weights once they got the balloons home and took turns holding the ribbons in their paws, and, luckily, the bears were all heavy enough (must be all those cream teas!) to hold the balloons down! That is, except for Tommy, who really struggled not to float off with his balloon!

When the bears let go of the ribbons, the balloons rose right up to the ceiling, so now the bears will have to wait a while for the helium to leak out enough so that the balloons will fall back down again. But they do still look very pretty up there!