Playing With Beads and....Air Plants!!!

I'm sure I don't need to admit to being a bead hoarder here and I'm sure I'm not the only one, Right?!

And as much as I love my mini printer tray bead storage, with all it's wonderful little spaces to keep all my lovely beads neat and organised (and that I lusted after for sooooo long) it still makes me feel just a little sad thinking that realistically it may well be years till some of those treasures see the light of day (other then the occasional fondling), So after Sue's wonderful post Rainbow Bead Garden Stake Project I got to thinking how else can I display those beads that are just too cute to leave in a draw (other then just blue tacking them randomly the walls, yes I do that)!

Then one day at the garden centre I saw an air plant display and... "light bulb".

So to make your air plant display you will need

• A large piece of drift wood (or an interesting rock)
• Some air plants and moss (mine are from Love Tilly)
• Silicone rubber sealant
• Air plant fertiliser
• A selection of animal and mushroom beads
• Some interesting crystals, tiny stones or even tiny shells

The first thing to do is to have a play around and get a rough idea of where you want to place things. I used one of the larger plants at the top of my drift wood in the hope that it would resemble a tree and a smaller plant in the middle with lots of moss around the bottom. 

Once you have decided where to put things then comes the glueing. The Silicone rubber sealant that you can get especially for the air plants is some what of a pain to use as it takes a few hours to dry. It suggests that you use rubber bands or wire to hold things in place while drying but I found this some what fiddly so as you will see in the next photo....

I held everything in place by propping things up or leaning heavy items on top of the things being glued. I glued an acorn cup into the "tree" as a birds nest and a few crystals and shells here and there for a bit of colour.

When the Silicone rubber sealant is dry then comes the fun part, adding the beads! Now of course I did not use the sealant on my precious (insert Gollum style voice) beads, because that would be daft and then I would not be able to use them! So instead I used blue tack....

One little owl in the nest and another on the ledge (I think I will need to replace him with a hedgehog or a lamb) and a couple of random mushrooms, oh and I am sure I have a pair of tiny rabbits some where! And there you have it a little display piece for some of your lamp work beads which has now got me thinking how cool would a desk top zen garden look (one of those little sand gardens) with beads instead of stones and a little wire wrapped rake with a tiny lamp work bead handle!!!

I would love to know if and of our readers display your beads in an unusual way?