Question

Sparkles the Clown makes balloon animals for children at birthday parties. At Bridget's party, she made 5 balloon poodles and 1 balloon giraffe, which used a total of 15 balloons. For Eduardo's party, she used 7 balloons to make 1 balloon poodle and 1 balloon giraffe. How many balloons does each animal require?

Answer 1

Let p be the number of balloons required to make one balloon poodle and g the number of balloons required to make one balloon giraffe.

Then we have:

I) 5p + g = 15

II) p + g = 7

Subtracting equation II from equation I, we have:

5p - p + g - g = 15 - 7

4p = 8

p = 8/4

p = 2

Replacing p with 2 in equation II we have:

2 + g = 7

g = 7 - 2

g = 5

Answer: Each poodle requires 2 balloons and each giraffe requires 5 balloons.