I dropped a bottle a little hard over a piece of rebar and had broken glass all over. I use a dab of adhesive putty now on the end of the rebar before I put a bottle on it. (The same stuff you use to stick pictures, etc to the wall or woodwork--you get it in just about any store in the stationery dept). It works fine, and lasts a long time since the bottle protects it and it never gets wet. Modeling clay or something like it would work too. Sandy

That little flamingo if very cute! It would be nice if he was a bit higher. I'm going to take apart my Fourth of July totem cuz I made it in the heat and set it in the hottest part of the garden and a piece or two slid. I'll let you know how it goes. To post a pic within your message: When you hover over a pic in your album a box will appear under it with 4 codes. This is the same box that is on the left under the words "share this ...." when you have a pic selected (big). You copy the html code which is the third down and paste it directly in your message. You can tell if it works when you preview the pic should be there. Good luck, Kathy

Just happened to wander in here and couldn't resist the thread title of "glass totems"! Thanks, Jenn for the nice words. Unfortunately most of my totem pics are on the computer that crashed and I haven't had them "rescued" yet. There are some pics on my Shutterfly of some of the "rejects". Here's the link: http://1lucky1.shutterfly.com/action/pictures?a=67b0de21b3557921453e They are not arranged in my garden but out by the driveway for the yard sale. I made about 2 dozen totems 2 years ago in the winter, sold the nicer ones that year and all the rest this last summer. We are planning to move and they are not at all easy to move. I'll definitely be making more, have a couple boxes of glass saved for them.

I live in zone 4, with some temps that border on zone 3, and I leave the glass bottles on my bottle tree and in my garden borders on stakes out all winter. Marlene hit it on the head with her observation that water getting into a bottle or glass bowl and then freezing is what typically causes breakage. My bottles are all upside down, so they stay safe during the coldest winters. Animals running through a garden account for the breakages I've experienced, but this can happen in any season!