Boiled Lolly Solar L.E.D. Light Outdoor Decoration

Made some boiled lolly lights one Christmas, this year they are getting new cellophane covers as the Australian sun is brutal and has drained all the colour out of them.

To make them you need the following

String of 200 solar led lights white only
12 x 2 litre recycled milk bottles
2 caps for the end bottles
12 sheets of coloured cellophane
Curling ribbon

Thoroughly rinse and dry milk bottles before you start. The last thing you want is your special decoration stinking of off milk when you pull it out of storage next year.

Drill a 10mm hole in centre of bottom of all bottles, taking care not to squeeze too hard as they are flimsy and can easily be put out of shape. And I feel the shape is important for them.

Next, drill 6mm holes in the 2 lids. The LED's are 5mm so holes need to be slightly bigger as heat shrink around base of LED's adds extras bulk.

Best to centre holes but not essential.

You could also make the bottom holes with a soldering iron, carefully push the tip through the milk bottle. The cap holes, however, need to be smaller so a drill is better.

I used a 200 led string for this project. They come as 2 x 100 strings attached to a Solar panel so the panel is between the centre 2 and there 6 bottles on either side so I arranged thet colors in order from the middle - next step.

I suggest you sit comfortably in a chair in front of the TV whilst you thread the entire string through the centre bottles first.

I left 12 lights inside the bottles and 5 between them, these will mostly be covered by the twisted ends of the cellophane wrappers. Keep count and continue to thread leaving 3 leds threaded through the cap on the last bottle of each string. Twist the caps on to the last bottles.

Ensure you haves enough sheets of cellophane to cover all the bottles, I used 2 sheets of each of 6 coloured sheets.

Lay the bottles out in 2 rows from the solar panel. Place the cellophane next to each bottle to arrange your colours coordination.

One sheet at a time unfold place under a bottle long ways and wrap sobs, deciding with a piece of sticky tape. Take a short length of curling ribbon, tie a bow like your shoelaces, close to the bottles.

Once all are wrapped they are ready to display

As these are designed to sit on the ground and are very light I decided U shaped garden stakes places over a tied end of every few bottles.

So, lay them wherever you decide, arranged in a circle, a line against a wall or however you choose, just be sure your solar panel is in full sun for most of the day.

Now wait for dark and they will light up.

The bright cellophane ensues they look pretty day or night.

I recommend replacing the cellophane every couple of years as it will fade.

These can also be places indoors provided the solar panel is close to a sumny window.

Enjoy!