Ma'iingan's Crafts: Witchy Potion Bottles (pt. 1?)

'Tis that time of year again when the air feels magical and Samhain comes upon us (or Halloween for the non-Witchy folk lol).

When I was a child I used to obsess with all things potions. My mom used to bring home small travel-sized bottles of shampoos, conditioners and lotions from the hotel she worked at, and I'd ask if I could have them to play "potions". I'd take these little bottles, empty them of their original contents and fill them with all kinds of colored waters, then pretend to mix them into my own personal potions. Naturally there wasn't much I could do with them besides mix colors, but it gave me a magical feel nonetheless.

The fur in this one is fur from my dog lol

Even today I obsess over potion bottles. I ***LOVE*** with a fiery passion bottles of all kinds, from the tiniest corked bottles, to large decanters and decorative liquid bottles. It takes all I have to not bring home every bottle I find, though there are times when I let myself go and buy pretty bottles with crafty ideas in mind.

Now that I'm older with my own money, and have my own little "Witchy Cottage" in which I can decorate to my hearts content with whatever **I** want, the time has come to make more realistic Witchy potion bottles. I have a plan to make both fantasy and practical Witch bottles in which to decorate my space.

I've been on the prowl on both Pinterest and YouTube looking for inspiration for my "potion bottle" makings, and have found some great ideas.

For this one, I am making dragon scales. Pine cone "teeth" painted with iridescent nail polish. Who knew?!?? So far I've only painted two pine cone "teeth", just to see how it comes out, and it looks amazing. I have other "dragon" themed ideas for other bottles, such as dragon teeth and claws. Both I plan on using clay to form (maybe a tutorial later on?), and may require larger bottles to fit (which is perfectly fine for me lol).

Next, was "cat whiskers". Someone came up with the idea of using fishing line cut to roughly the size of cat whiskers and place them in a bottle. Because I figure that most whiskers are black (or at least they are on the dogs I've had), I used black upholstery thread (it's fairly thick string) and placed it in a small bottle. Super, super easy. No skill involved (unless you decorate the bottle, but that will come later).

These are but a couple of inspired ideas for mere "fantasy" bottles used for decorating my little home 20ft away from home (lol). I have a few other jars that contain practical ingredients for my practical practices. They contain herbs I've gathered throughout the course of my practice. But, after looking at all the ideas for fantasy bottles, I've come up with the idea of using "witchy codes" for my herbs...like "graveyard dirt" for my mullein, "bloodwort" for yarrow and "beggars buttons" for burdock. Naturally I'll add the common names for them somewhere on the bottles (probably the bottom) just so I don't confuse myself lol.

I just love these ideas. The more I can create a witchy atmosphere in my cottage, I assume the better I can be at my practices. Hopefully you will have the same effect. Blessed Samhain