What are you using for glue ritaweeda? GE silicone II works well. I have a penny covered BB I made into a fountain and I have four other balls in my garden. Two with glass stones two w/o. I found a large rot iron candle holder at a garage sale and buried it in the ground. It holds my BB very nicely. In the spring it may list a little but I just pack the dirt with my foot. My two w/o stones are colorful but they are fading. They sit under oaks in my shade garden but still the color is slowly fading away.

Kirk, Oh, the LOVE of BB's! You did find a really cool one. Those swirly marbelized/glitter ones are the neatest! I had one that was a burnt orange/red swirly so I left it as is in the garden. It WAS shiny too. Eventually the shine lost it's lustre and it did crack. I was so dissappointed but didn;t know what else to do. SO, #1 son, Sean, and I took a chisel and a hammer to it! I wanted to see it's insides. Did you know that a BB will bounce on concrete? It took some effort but we did crack the egg open! :-) The top layers were a polyethylene plastic material. The inside had a composite plastic/light concrete/foam like center shaped like a barbell. From expereince the older balls are made with rubber and wood. I had my FIL drill a hole through the center of two balls. One is still sitting in the garage. The other became a fountain bubbler in my bathroom. Getting back to care---you may want to avoid the extreme temps with your BB. Ours would get the 100 and teens plus temps in the summer and down to the teen temps in the winter. Whatever bowlers use to put a nice shine on their balls would be what I would use to keep it shiny. If you ignore it it will eventually lose it's shine.... You had some NICE neighbors to give you that wonderful eagle! The BB is it's golden pearl! BTW, we need to see your rain chain! :-) Hope you have an excellent weekend. Three day weekend for you? Yep, us too! It's nice to NOT be a banana sandwich on a weekeday! TTYL Love, Jules Here is a link that might be useful: BB in the garden

That's interesting! That really must be an old ball! So the shell of it was rubber or plastic??? I had posted to Kirk about my experiences with them. One I tried drilling a hole (to make a bubbler fountain). Well, my drill is wimpy and got stuck about halfway through. FIL drilled it with his all the way thorugh and even another BB too! The one I partially did came out with polyethelene and what looked like wood shavings. BUT, one ball that I had in my garden cracked. My son and I did it in all the way in with a chisel and a hammer. It's innards were a barbell shaped foam conrete material. Some of the older black balls were made of rubber on the outside I know for sure. WEll, yours, even though injured, looks like it still has life in it. I'm thinking a rooster/chicken head with feathers coming out the holes. Oh, the Martian with the helmut from Bugs Bunny, a quails head with feathers on top....or a mosaic-ed BB. Have fun with it. Love, Jules

I am so glad that people had advised you to use the SE11. I made a mistake when I made my first ball. I used weldbond, which I love for my indoor mosaics, it works great! For outdoor use? BAD IDEA! Its not for outdoor use. Soooo, I made a beautiful ball and worked long on it and now its still beautiful, but it needs to stay indoors for its life. which is okay, it lives in my living room. OMG I can't belive this, who is from Madison??? Thats where I live, oh my, I have never met anyone who does mosaics befor from Madison, if your out there I would love to talk to you!!!! Louella