Light My Etched Glass Bottle!

It's been raining, windy and stormy for the past 2 weeks or more, so it's hard to think about backyard celebrations, but when we do I'll be ready - for the decorating part at least....  I have fairy lights hanging across the back patio and they're not just for Christmas.  They look so pretty, I keep them up year round together with lanterns and lots of votive candles.  I've recently been using the LED ones. LOVE them!  They don't blow out when it's windy and there are lots of ways to decorate them, but.... I'll leave that for another post because now I have something new to share.

A few days ago my friend at etchall® sent me this "Light My Bottle" stick and asked me what I thought. 

OMG, I just LOVE it.  I've put LED twinkle lights in glass containers before, but never really knew what to do with the battery holder.  Well the batteries are inside this light stick which fits perfectly into the neck of a bottle.  The rounded top is the switch.  It sits on top and all you have to do is to tap it lightly to turn it on or off.  It looks nice and twinkly inside any kind of bottle, but when the bottle is etched, the light is diffused and it looks just gorgeous.  I'm sorry my photos don't do it justice.

I used it with two bottles.  The first is a beer bottle.......  I removed the labels (they came off quite easily in warm water) and the second is a wine bottle.... we've obviously been partying at my house in spite of the weather.... LOL.  NOTE:  I used NAPTHA (from the hardware store) to remove the labels from the wine bottle - great stuff!  I etched the bottles with etchall® dip'n etch by placing them in an empty soda bottle (you can find detailed instructions in my previous post here http://juliemcguffee.blogspot.com/2014/09/glass-etching.html).  They would have been just as good if I'd left them plain. but for some reason I could see dragonflies dancing around the brown bottle and tiny stars on the green one, so I created a simple dragonfly shape and cut multiples from etchmask™ on my Cricut Explore®.  Obviously you can use any digital die cutting machine.  (I've uploaded the jpeg on my "images for personal use tab" so please feel free to use it for personal projects).  You can also find dragonfly peel off stickers.

I copied and pasted the image multiple times on the sheet then removed the etchmask from around the images, so my sheet looked like this making it much easier to pick up each dragonfly.

Carefully remove each dragonfly with the pick tool.  If you pull gently from the outside of the wing, the cutouts will remain on the sheet.

I positioned the dragonflies on the bottle before placing in the dip'n etch, so the finished bottle looked like this - without the lights then with......  I also had a small dragonfly punch, so I punched smaller shapes from scraps of etchmask and added those too.

I had a sheet of small Peel Off star stickers which I used to cover the wine bottle before placing in the dip'n etch.  EZPZ.....

NOTE:  Don't forget to fill the bottles with water before placing in the dip'n etch, or they will float.

After 15 minutes in dip'n etch, remove the bottles then rinse and dry the insides thoroughly.  They are now ready for the light stick.  

The brown bottle is shorter, so I wrapped the light cord snugly around the stick, (don't forget to put the batteries in first), then carefully inserted the stick into the neck of the bottle.

Since the wine bottle was taller, I only wrapped the bottom couple of inches of the stick, pushed the lights into the bottle then added the stick last.

See how easy it is to light up your life... you'll definitely be the "light" of your party with these decorations.  Enjoy!  Y'all come back now....

Yours truly,

Julie :)

KEEP CALM AND CARRY ON CRAFTING!