Bottlecap necklace tutorial

I enjoy making little unique gifts to put in my children's goodie bags for birthday parties. As they get older, they grow out of the little plastic toys that usually come in goodies bags. For my daughter's party, I wanted to make something that would be unique for each of the girls but still something that tied them all together. Does that even make sense? Anyway, I've wanted to make bottlecap necklaces for a while and this seemed like a great opportunity.

Here's what you need:
1. unused bottlecaps (my hubbie is a homebrewer, so we have tons. You can get them off etsy or the internet)
2. mallet for smashing
3. heat gun
4. small images or fancy paper for inside bottlecap
5. Dimension Magic (or possibly Glossy Accents?)
6. tiny drill bit or nail/hammer
7. cord or chain for hanging (from Michael's)
8. jump rings (from Michael's)
9. something for cutting 1 inch circles (die cut machine, punch, etc.)
10. Mod Podge

First, smash your bottlecaps using the mallet. I put the bottlecaps on my cutting mat and smashed them while the mat was on the floor.

Then using your heat gun, heat up the seal inside the bottlecap. When heated, the seal becomes soft and you can pull or scrape it out of the bottlecap.

Using my Cricut, I cut a 1 inch circle from white cardstock. I stamped my image and colored with watercolor pencils.

Using mod podge, adhere the circle inside the bottlecap. Let this dry completely.

Add the dimensional magic to the bottlecap. Fill it up all the way and make sure there are no bubbles.

 

A few ways to insure no bubbles are to store the bottle upside-down before using it. Also, squeeze out a tiny amount of liquid in the bottle onto a spare piece of paper to get all the bubbles out of the tip. If you do get a bubble, pop it quickly with a safety pin or something sharp.

The dimensional magic will appear cloudy. Let this dry for at least 24 hours. And this is when I started having problems. Turns out the ink and the watercolor pencils smeared and yellowed when the dimensional magic was totally dry. I didn't have any other ink. I also heard that Copic pens don't smear, but I don't have any. So I ended up laminating the stamped circles before adhering them to the bottlecap. I know, total overkill. But it worked and the ink/color stayed true.

My husband then punched holes in the bottlecaps using a nail and a hammer. You could certainly use a drill bit, but we didn't have one small enough. Add the jump rings to the holes in the bottlecaps and string your cord/string through. You are now done!

 

To personalize them a little bit, I added another jump ring to the bottom and a different colored flower charm to each. My daughter got to pick which color went to which friend. She really enjoyed that. 

The dimensional magic really gives these a nice shine and cover. You can't really see that from the photos. They were a fun item to add to the girl's birthday goodie bags! Now I want to experiment with other inks and markers. It's got to be easier than laminating the circles. These would also be cute with just pretty patterned paper in the middle. No need to worry about ink and pencils.

There you have it, bottlecap necklaces. Thanks for stopping by today!