Tuesday, August 31st, 2010

To say the summer went by too quickly is an understatement. Very few people are looking forward to the end of summer and all that goes with it. Teachers will have been bracing themselves, no, getting ready for the return of students for the past few weeks but virtually everyone else will have a moment where they suddenly realize summer is over, fall is coming and there shall be no more extended holidays for many, many months to come. In the spirit of the end of summer, the end of August and in the hope for more good days than bad, an evening of sky lanterns would be an excellent way to spend the evening.

Whether you simply had a slow day at work from too much Bank Holiday fun yesterday or are going mad looking for school supplies for your school aged child, taking some time this evening to launch floating lanterns can change your mood and get you ready for the next day. For each person, their reason for launching lanterns may be different but the effect is the same: relaxation and a sense of peace.

History tells us that sky lanterns were used traditionally as a prayer vessel. The person would write a prayer on a floating lantern and then would launch it into the night sky knowing that their message of hope, peace, wealth, love and more would make it to the heavens and hopefully would be answered. Today, many people use sky lanterns in a semi-traditional manner. While they may not believe that a diety will answer their prayers, the symbolism of setting one’s dreams and hopes free to float away is not lost either. For the parent, for example, they may send up paper lanterns with the hopes for success for their children in the coming school year and the children may launch floating lanterns in the hopes that August gets extended for just a couple more weeks.

For everyone in the UK, the close of August is also the close of festival season. For some, this could be considered a good thing, especially if they live near somewhere were a festival is held. For others, the end of festival season means going back to the mundane, daily life or even time to find a normal job until the next festival season starts up next year. For many people, launching sky lanterns with the hope of prosperity is but one thing they will do to help kick start their job search. While some students will be cutting back their hours so they can go to school, others will be entering the workforce for the first time and for both groups, sky lanterns are a good choice to wish them luck in their ventures, both money motivated and academically motivated.

So let’s all say Cheers to August, summer and to a certain extent freedom and get back to work. Evenings and weekends become our consolation prize, all great times to launch sky lanterns to remind ourselves of the summer of fun we all had.

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Monday, August 30th, 2010

Whether you intend to travel to West London for the Notting Hill Carnival street festival, with the expected attendance of over a million people or simply plan on having a nice, relaxing holiday at home, sky lanterns are a perfect complement to either way you may spend this bank holiday. If you go to the street festival, there are places where an evening launch of floating lanterns can be done in a safe manner and if you are at home, you can launch them during the day or evening to spectacular results as well. With NightSkyLantern.co.uk’s lanterns, you get the best quality, environmentally responsible lanterns available for the best prices in the country. Whether you launch responsibly near the Notting Hill Carnival or from home, you find that those around you will appreciate the beauty of the floating lanterns catching a light breeze and drifting up towards the heavens and, potentially, far away.

The Notting Hill Carnival on the Summer Bank Holiday is an adult’s only affair, with the family friendly version actually occurring on Sunday. Expect large crowds of people as well as a festive parade that is truly global in its scope. With a focus on bringing a Caribbean style carnival to London, each year the Notting Hill Carnival becomes one great big party. While the Caribbean roots, especially Trinidad, are dark, there is nothing dark about this festival. It is big, bold and brightly coloured and is the oldest street festival in Europe, starting in 1964 and running continuously since 1966. Celebrate from outside the area with sky lanterns and avoid the crowds but still enjoy the atmosphere that makes up this festival.

If you do decide to dive into this Carnival, be prepared for a sensory explosion. Visually, the parade costumes are simply stunning as your ears are hit with many different styles of Caribbean music. From Calypso and Steel Pan music as part of the parade to Reggea and more being pumped through static sound systems all around the Notting Hill area, the historical music and the styles that have been generated from it are all represented. On top of this, your sense of smell and taste will be ignited by the food stalls, selling all varieties of Caribbean food.

If you opt to skip the Carnival because of crowds or simply because you have had your fill of festivals for the summer, bringing a little of the carnival magic home with sky lanterns is a tranquil way to spend your Summer Bank Holiday. Whether you choose to decorate your traditional sky lanterns with colour and flair fit for the Carnival or you choose to simply send up these delicate paper lanterns filled with hope for a short work week that goes by quickly, there is no end to the possibilities when using sky lanterns.

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Sunday, August 29th, 2010

Today is the second day of the Twinwood Festival which is a giant Swing, Jazz and Jive festival which has incorporated the formally separate Glen Miller Festival. This bank holiday weekend event draws some great musical acts from all over the world and best of all, there are still tickets available for the final day. Yes, a festival which is not completely sold out for the entire time. While there are no camping spots available, there are tickets available for Monday’s day of festivities at the Twinwood and Glen Miller Festival. Keep in mind though that the Twinwood Festival is held at an airfield so any sky lantern launches should be done with care and only with permission from the airfield.

While the festival is a fun atmosphere, there should be level of respect for the regulations so this festival can continue to be held besides the Twinwood airfield for years to come. The airplanes taking off and landing nearby adds to the ambiance of the festival atmosphere, all geared around the 40’s and 50’s. Period clothing is the norm, including many gentlemen in WWII uniforms and the music and dancing are both appropriate for the time period as well. While sky lanterns have been used for centuries, they have not been popular in the UK for all that long, only picking up in the past ten years or so. So while they can enhance any event, they may be seen as something foreign at the Twinwood Festival.

If you do choose to launch them at the Glen Miller Festival, again be sure to secure permission to launch them from the airfield’s authorities and perhaps dress them up in the style of the fourties or fifties. Writing war slogans on the side of the lanterns would truly add to the festivities. Seeing the war slogans of fifty years ago would energize the crowd and make it feel more like the 1940’s, without all the worries that that time period brought to the people of the UK. Floating lanterns are a tranquil media for any type of message and is viewable for miles. For the person who really wants to celebrate the 1940’s, resurrecting some of the adverts of the day would be a fun way to really do so.

For those looking to celebrate the music, a launch of paper lanterns adorned with musical notes or drawings of the instruments would be a great way to celebrate. For this purpose, our wire free cylindrical lantern would be an excellent choice, big enough to even support an artist’s rendition of a Bass Violin.

Remember, all of NightSkyLanterns.co.uk’s sky lanterns are wire free, making us the most environmentally conscious sky lantern vendor in the UK. We were the first to develop a wire free design in our ECO lanterns and have since encorporated a second wire free design into our traditional sky lanterns and cylindrical lanterns as well.

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