This past winter, I explained to Mark that I found it extra difficult to work on my thesis with A.J. around and no work surface in our family room. (It was difficult enough to find spare minutes to read or write, but not having a work surface made the challenge greater.) I have a home office, but it is fairly cluttered and there are lots of books which are super interesting – especially to a toddler. So Mark made me this awesome wood table – exactly what I was envisioning for our family room.
A couple of months ago my mom mentioned that she was throwing out a lamp. It’s fairly dated (no offense, mom! Though you already know this since you bought a new one and were looking to get rid of this one). I asked if I could take it, guessing that it would be fairly simple to give it a makeover.
For months I’ve been on the lookout for a lamp shade for the lamp makeover. The shades I saw were too pricey or too big or just too trendy. I wanted something that would make the lamp look more modern (than it’s plain green lampshade on a brass base), but not too contemporary for our century country home.
I finally came across a lampshade that fit my cost/look ratio criteria. At first I wasn’t too sure how I felt about it – would I grow tired of the colours? Was it too pink? But I liked how colourful it was, and A.J. has recently come to love butterflies. I figured even if I eventually grow tired of it in the family room, maybe it will eventually be something that can go in her room once we renovate upstairs.
In the loft of our shop, the old owners left this old melamine tv unit that I am in the process of refinishing as a play kitchen for A.J. In searching for paints suitable for melamine (limited options from what I’ve found…), I came across Krylon Dual Superbond. In experimenting with it a little on the tv unit, I really like it. Ask anyone, Mark and I hate painting. But I have become recently fascinated with the ease of spray painting. There are limited “fun” colours in the Dual Superbond type of Krylon paint, but luckily the “Ivy Leaf” colour was both a fun shade and perfectly matches the tiny green butterflies on the lamp shade. Two quick coats later and…
My camera doesn’t quite capture the true colour of the green
Cost of the lamp makeover: a little over $30 ($19.98 for the lamp shade and $6.94 for the spray paint). Could I have found a cheaper lamp? Yeah, probably. But I love that mine is so colourful and custom. And I saved something from the dump, reducing landfill waste. I really love projects that involve restoring something that would have otherwise been chucked into the garbage.
Plus A.J. had some fun too. While I was cooking dinner last night, I hear behind me “Lamp. Hat.” (Sorry for the blurry pics; I quickly snapped pictures from my phone before the novelty of a lampshade hat worn off).
This Is My Creativity 