Webster the Frog

Bubba the BullFrog

Order Axtell Frog Puppets here

SQUIRTING FLOWER IDEA for Bubba Bullfrog!

You can mount a squirting flower to the lilly pad! You can purchase one at any novelty shop or clown supply.
Just disconnect the flower from the tube and make a hole in the latex lilly pad. This can be done with a sharp knife or sissor blade. Insert the tube from the bottom through the hole and replace the flower. Glue the flower onto the stem with some plastic glue, being careful not to block the water hole with glue.

The bulb will now be located under the lilly pad. Fill it with water and now you have a squirting lilly! A great surprise. The flower can be pink or white - Have fun!

Sydney Gay Kislevitz and
her jazz singing frog. 

A Bubba ROUTINE IDEA #2 - "Balloon Animals"

Begin with making balloon animals. If you don't happen to make balloon animals, or it doesn't fit your style - do some gags like these: Blow up a long blue pencil balloon and tie it. Exaggerate the fact that your going to make the world's fastest balloon animal.....count 1 -2 -3 and bend it into a "J" shape (remember that a "J" should look backwards to you, for it to be correct to your audience). Announce that it is a "Blue Jay". (Other gags could include a long green balloon as a snake etc.) The point here is to establish what you are doing - making balloon animals.

Now that the premise has been established say, "I'm just kidding, I really can make balloon animals"...pick up a deflated 10-14" round green balloon and say, "now I will make the most difficult balloon animal in the world!"

Begin to inflate the balloon but pretend that it will only inflate a tiny bit. Act as if it's the hardest thing you have ever done in your life....it just won't inflate any more than a couple of ounces. Say, "I was right, this IS the most difficult balloon animal in the world!"

Really get red in the face while you try to inflate it again....and get cross eyed, embarrassed etc. Stop and rest, stretch the balloon a bit try again...repeat etc. Then excuse yourself for a moment and turn your back to the audience...in a slow evasive way and explode with activity as you try to stretch and blow that crazy thing up! finally turn around out of breath.

Your audience will be laughing loudly if you play it right. With the balloon held tightly at the end with just a few ounces in it....look at it and announce that you have succeeded as you promised ...holding the balloon slightly inflated by the end, announce that it is a "TADPOLE!" You may even want to draw a little face on it if your audience is close. After the laugh, ask the audience if they have ever seen a real tadpole? "You know that a tadpole is just a baby frog. A frog is really a tadpole just bigger....and it doesn't have a tail, and it grows legs, and it's covered with bumps. Isn't that amazing that nature makes something so slimy and ugly grow up into....something so slimy and ugly! Maybe we can make this tadpole grow up into a frog with a little magic! All we need to do is blow the tadpole up and it will grow into a frog, but this balloon is being difficult and I just don't seem to have enough lung power to do it by myself so maybe you all could help me!"

Tell your audience to take a deep breath and on the count of three to blow at you as hard as they can and you will catch all their breath together an then you can surely blow it up. Tell the tadpole "this won't hurt a bit" 1 -2 -3 BLOW! As they do, open your mouth and inhale as if catching all their breath in your mouth and then hold your breath with your cheeks puffed out. This will get a laugh especially if it appears difficult to hold it all in.

Then cross your fingers and blow up the balloon very laboriously to full size. Finally when you do it hold it with both hands on the end and as you examine the balloon say that this doesn't look like a frog - just an over inflated tadpole....hey little buddy are you okay? Let the air escape between your fingers so it squeals loudly as it deflates. Now act as if it's the tadpole screaming in pain and wear a look of anguish on your face.

After it's empty say "poor little guy", and let the balloon hang down drooping. Tap the hanging balloon for signs of life with your index finger. Then ask "is there a veterinarian in the house? This guy looks awful, what do tadpoles need to live?" "WATER"! they'll shout. So you get a pan (empty bottom of the loaded duck pan) and toss the balloon into it. Pretend that it has water in it, swish the pan as if trying to revive the tadpole holding the pan close to your face looking in.

With your face near the pan make the sound of a sneeze (as if the tadpole sneezed on you) then pull your face back with a grimaced expressions and wipe off your face. "Poor little fellow must be catching a cold. I better cover him up to keep him from getting sick.".... put the lid on the duck pan - releasing the latex frog load into the closed pan but do not open the pan yet. If you haven't worked with a pan before, realize that the gimmicked lid must be held so the audience cannot see the inside of it revealing the load. Now holding just the covered pan, with the loaded frog, you tell your audience that in the fairy tales - a princes could kiss a frog and turn it into a handsome prince. So maybe if we all blew a magical kiss on the count of three, we could at least turn our tadpole into a frog! (An alternative would be to have a volunteer come up and blow a kiss at the pan. This can be very fun for a group of older children who giggle when "kissing" is mentioned.)

When the "magic" is done, lift the lid revealing the latex frog! After the applause, You can now use it as a puppet! Pre-recorded voice on cassette can be used, if you're not a ventriloquist or if you would like to learn how to be a ventriloquist we offer several learning books and tapes.

Timothy Trust in Germany

Rae Schaper and friends with "Booker"
in a New Orleans Nat'l Speech convention.

Bubba ROUTINE IDEA #1
"FROG IN MY THROAT!"
Note: The smaller frog Bubba will fit into a Duck Pan for a magical production routine.

---

SET-UP: Load the frog in the duck pan and stretch the end of an 11 - 13" green round balloon onto your thumb. Inflate the balloon while on your thumb by pulling one side away from your thumb and blowing into the opening. Only inflate the balloon slightly until it's shaped like a tadpole. Then with your thumb still stopping the balloon, bend the balloon at your thumb back into your palm. Cover or "palm" the balloon with your fingers in a relaxed pose and your ready to go.

ROUTINE:
Approach your audience and begin to speak with a raspy voice. Something like this...."Good evening ladies and gentlemen...(cough)...excuse me I must have a frog in my throat." Reach your fist to your face turn slightly as if you will clear your throat and release the balloon into your open hand. Act as if you coughed it up and hold it with both hands. Create animation and the appearance of a big wiggling tadpole by wiggling your thumb and balloon from within the stage of your open hands.

Say "I guess I just had a small frog in my throat - it's a tadpole! That's strange....well isn't a tadpole just a little frog? So let's make it bigger and SEE if it will turn into a frog!

Pull it off your thumb and begin to inflate it. If you are a ventriloquist throw in some screams between breaths, like "Oh NO!!!" once inflated proceed with the above routine until it is placed deflated into the pan bottom. You could then begin to tell your audience that you will attempt to magically turn the tadpole into a frog....but continue to be interrupted by the tadpole, using your vent voice. After a while of asking him to please be quiet, you cover the pan with the lid and begin using a MUFFLED VOICE.

Do some magic gestures or say those magic words, "Tadpolopious - growinupious - frogsapillius - ribbitupious!" The high muffled voice of the tadpole begins to change into a low muffled "RIBBIT" sound. Take off the lid and bingo! IT'S CHANGED!

Living in a swamp isn't that bad... if you... like living in swamps!

Excuse me I've got a person in my throat!

Come on over to my pad sometime! I just redecorated the walls with fly paper!

My Uncle Wart was in real estate... he owned a pad-dominium complex. He said it was a slimy business. If you don't watch your step, you can get soaked! I guess it got too much for him....he finally croaked! It ended up okay though, he donated his organs to science!

My wife is pregnant. We're expecting a little more than triplets. Us frogs have so many babies we name them all the same....ugly! They look so funny! What's really hard is trying to put diapers on tadpoles! They keep slipping off! I like the toddler stage myself...when those tiny little legs finally start growing!

I stopped eating flies because it always gives me a "buzz"! ...Just say "NO" to flies!