Throughout my life I have involved myself in many types of arts and crafts - back in the day when I seemed to have a lot more free time - jewelry, painting, crochet (although I don't dig fabric and fiber all that much anymore), polymer clay, wire wrapping, ceramics, (and still some hope to be working with glass someday)! Totally right brained! Since then I have since thrown myself fully into the leaf casting, and a lot of the rest of this work was set aside.
But, 16 years ago ,when my husband was diagnosed with cancer, and I had to give him injections of Neupogen, which came in extremely tiny bottles, I felt I needed to do something positive with these expensive little vials of glass, something that would give my mind an activity besides worrying (FYI, hubby's doing very well these days!). I started to use the bottles as a base for bead weaving, and came up with this-
Total height is 1 3/4 inches, plus the seed beads are size 14/0, which is much smaller than the average bead 11/0 (like what you would find on Native American beadwork). The higher the number,the smaller the bead. I actually have some size 22/0, but have never been brave (or crazy) enough to work with them!
Plus a polymer clay stopper to match.
This next one is still my favorite-
Yes, I actually beaded myself a snake, complete with a little "basket" for it to stay in!
The snake is totally separate, beaded on poseable wire
Isn't he cute?
Even the bottom's beaded!
...I found other bottles for beading, like this Tabasco sample (YES, I washed it out very well!)
From this....
...To this....
And more polymer clay formed onto the top - for this slightly larger one I used size 11/0 beads
I found these two great little bottles with jeweled caps at some flea market. They are actually NOT finished (I want to bead the bottoms), so you might catch a glimpse of a thread here and there. 14/0 or 15/0 beads.
Another great bottle, which I'm a little disappointed in - I used high quality seed beads on this, and the pink color you see is the blue beads' color lining seeping into the white! Don't think there is any correcting it, though =-(
Of course,this went on long after the spousal unit felt better - I was on a roll! This one is wearable and is on a chain. I called it a Treasure Bottle, and was so proud of it till said spousal unit blurted out, "Hey, looks like a coke bottle!" Uh, no, he didn't mean the soft drink! Anyway, that wasn't my artistic intention behind this project :-}
Can't recall where this little glass tube and stopper was found, but it was just the right size for my beading needles!
For this one, I didn't need to go around any curves, so I used Japanese Delica seed beads, which are shaped like tiny cylinders and are very uniform.
The stopper was also embellished with a polymer clay flower. I have used this for my needles (hey, that could go with the coke bottle!... I'm KIDDING!) for several years now.
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