THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, January 14, 1996 TAG: 9601120179
SECTION: SUFFOLK SUN PAGE: 02 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: Faces and Places
SOURCE: Susie Stoughton
LENGTH: Medium: 76 lines
It's hard to be certain, but Debi Ward just might have had something to do with the Blizzard of '96.
There was no hint of white anywhere when she called to say she had a 30-foot snowman in her Holland yard. Sure, I thought, wondering how she could have even a miniature Frosty there. The area hadn't had more than a few flakes for the past two years.
I decided to humor Ward. Tell me about this incredible creature, I urged.
``He's wonderful,'' she said. ``He's not just tall. He's a fat, jolly, roly-poly thing. He's huge - one arm and gloved hand bigger than my body.''
By the time I got to see this white wonder, the ground was sprinkled with a soft, powdery blanket - the kind of snow that makes the world beautiful but doesn't make roads impassable. A snowman should be in a snow-covered yard, after all.
I stared, unaware of the blizzard heading our way. Looking back, Frosty must have been a harbinger of sorts.
``We put a snowman up in the front yard and brought the snow,'' Ward said.
With a black top hat and a carrot nose, Frosty - an inflatable, cold-air balloon - looked much like the real thing, only bigger than any snowman I'd ever imagined.
Frosty had come to her house the day before New Year's Eve from a perch atop the Miller Oil building in downtown Norfolk.
``When you don't have snow, you do what you can,'' Ward said.
Rene Meier, owner of Balloon Promotions Inc., insists that Frosty and each of his other balloons is washed each time they are taken down.
Kathy Holland, Ward's sister and the company's promotional director, thought Ward would enjoy having Frosty for a visit and a scrub.
But giving a 30-foot snowman a bath is somewhat like washing an elephant, Ward said.
``He's so big that he's staggering,'' she said, looking at the snowman that towered nearly three stories as he peeped over her porch roof.
Meier, who lives in Gloucester, also rents other cold-air balloons, takes people on hot-air balloon rides and gives flying lessons.
Ward, who has a purple balloon ``Dream Catcher,'' should have her lighter-than-air license soon.
``I always wanted to fly,'' she said. ``But I said when I fly, I am going to fly free.''
Hot-air ballooning is something she wanted to do for years.
``When we were children, we used to go out in the field and lay in the grass and look at the clouds,'' she said. ``I wondered what it would be like to float on a cloud.''
Flying in a hot-air balloon is about as close as you can come to that ``without being an angel,'' she said.
Flying is the easy part; landing can be a little tricky, she said.
The pilot doesn't know ahead of time where the landing site will be, so a chase vehicle must follow to pick up the occupants.
``We've landed in a large front yard, in fields or in the median of the road,'' Ward said.
Meier can set a balloon down ``almost on a dime,'' she said, but ``I need a much bigger space. The bigger the field, the better.''
Her husband, John, and her three teenage children are accustomed to watching her float across the skies. They also know she's been known to swat bumblebees with badminton rackets and snipe for ground hogs from a wood shed roof.
So they weren't surprised to come home recently and find their huge, front-yard visitor.
Just in case this snow begins to wear on some people's nerves, Holland is looking for another balloon - maybe a sunbather beneath a palm tree. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by JOHN H. SHEALLY II
Frosty the cold-air balloon attracts an audience in Debi Ward's
yard.
by CNB