late night lamp fun decoupage tutorial

O.k., so we were having a birthday party for the big sister this weekend and I have decided that the bare light bulb above the kitchen table must go. It wasn't always bare...we have had various types of beaded lamps or paper shades there for years. Late last winter I made a 'chandelier' of twigs all painted bright, shiny red. I loved it. The bulb is frosted and fancy, so you could just see it thru the sticks. If you have been in my stores you know I love bunches of sticks, painted, with lights in them. It is a perennial display item. The bunch over the table was quite nice but my husband wasn't fond of it at all. He called it the 'eye-liminator' as it would sometimes poke him in the eye if he didn't sit down at the right angle or tried to reach across the table too fast. In a fit of conciliatory nesting I clipped the red twig chandelier down about two months ago but hadn't replaced it.

Well, at 11:00 on Thursday night I realized that this was not o.k. We needed a new lamp before the party. Lots of folks were coming to our house, many for the first time. I didn't care if most of them were under the age of five. We had a cheap white linen shade and somehow I got the idea to Decopatch it. I put the paper on the inside. OHH-LA-LA! This is the best thing ever. The shade is demure by day, just white linen, and then at night it just glows with all the paper color. It may be a bit too technicolor for me; I used a tad bit too much blue and green, but it is overall quite lovely. It is a bit like having some special party decorations in the room.

The funny thing is that I didn't really have any Decopatch paper at home. Well, I had one partial sheet. So I did take advantage of the fact that, for me, the craft store is always open. My mom was already in her jammies when I got this idea and all I had to say was "Mom, get dressed, we're going to Ornamentea" and she was ready. My mom is a good person to spring last minute, late night crafting projects on. We got the paper and got back home and had the lampshade up by 12:30. Seriously, this whole project took one and one half hours including shopping time, rewiring the bulb fixture, and all the paper tearing and gluing.
Here are pics and my steps.


This is the lamp showing you the outside. Plain, plain old lamp shade. You can see the paper thru it because I took this picture at night.







Here is the inside of the lamp shade while I was Decopatching it. I have to say, the glue is quite nice, it dries really glossy and is completely waterproof!



Here I am, hard at work. My mom helped steady the lamp shade as it wanted to roll all around the table. If you try this all alone I would suggest a rolled up towel under the shade.


And here is the shade lit up and lovely. Isn't that beautiful?
Do this at home, kids!

what to buy

It is always a bit of a quandry, what to buy for the store? We sell mostly beads and all the associated stringing material and books and tools, but then we have other things as well. When we first started the store I would just order things I personally wanted when I was at gift shows or apparel shows and then figure out how to sell them. Sometimes I would order a 'hot' trend item at the show just to see if I could sell it. For instance, we sell this French soap, Pre de Provence, that I really like. It's my favorite soap and you couldn't get it in Raleigh until we sold it. Now, it's not the top seller, but we do have folks that come in specifically for the soap and we do have folks that buy it as an extra after they got their beads. I often used to order odd or funky tote bags as I have a bit of a tote bag addiction and would see them at shows and think 'hmm, gotta have that.' We've had Mexican oilcloth bags, Brazilian bags with sun-tan lotion ads on them, French vinyl shopping bags, some giant totes with fake funny ads and pictures of doll heads and recycled drink containers turned into bags. I am trying to be good about that because although they used to sell like crazy they don't anymore. I guess maybe weird tote bags from Viet Nam with chickens or guavas on them aren't in fashion right now.
We've also sold lighting of all kinds including lovely hanging lamps from Mexican glass blowers (I have one in the entry of my house!), some HEAVY metal animals like horses and pigs, flat Chinese mary jane shoes, all kinds of decorative hooks and chocolate bars. I sort of think, well, we need display items anyway so why not sell them? And the chocolate, do I need to explain that?

new stuff

Whee! We just got this box of amazing vintage-y stickers from Cavallini and I am going to go nuts. I brought a bunch home and am putting them into pendant bezels right now. Well, actually the Diamond Glaze is drying right now. Ohhh, they are so lovely. I am going to make myself a sweet necklace and maybe a new, really noisy charm bracelet out of them.

Can you tell Nora is napping and Cleo is at a play date this afternoon? Free time for me!

mixed metal

Well, since I couldn't exactly type my woes away this week (with the mac on it's death bed) I made some jewelry. This necklace is made of headpins and some pink tourmaline I had been hoarding. It is very delicate looking but as I gently hardened the headpins after I bent them it's pretty sturdy. The magnetic clasp was a desperation moment. I had no gold clasps at home...geeze, you'd think I could manage to get my hands on one somewhere!

That is a problem I have had a lot since I set up a studio at home this past winter. I never have everything I want. I used to work at the store, and that meant a sort of unlimited supply of whatever I needed. With a second baby on the way I realized that if I couldn't do it at home it wasn't ever going to get done, so we rearranged and set up a studio at the house. It is nice, I can work for a few minutes at a time whenever I have the time but it set off a shopping frenzy on my part. I didn't have my own anything-I had used all the store stuff and just pulled from stock when I needed it (don't worry, I accounted for it in inventory!) I had to 'buy' a ring mandrel, flush cutters, a crimper, rulers, artbins to hold beads, a bazillion spools and coils of wire, a bench block and hammer and all kinds of other do-dads. The only tools I had of my own were some Lindstom pliers (so nice!), an assortment of round pliers and a pair of those Soft-Flex cutters that I scammed out of Mike from Soft-Flex by saying that there was no way they could be worth $70 (um, they are, thanks Mike!)

So I bought all that stuff (and made for a good day at the store!) but I still don't remember to get all I need for each project. I usually have to put the clasp on in the morning, first thing when I get to work. Or I do a lot of mixed metal projects. You know, 'hmm, I would make this all in sterling but I only have copper jumprings and a copper clasp...' Mixed metal it is!

the mac is dead

It has been a while since I have posted here. Sorry. The mac is dead. Yep. For a while my problem was limited to a 'j' key that didn't work periodically but last week it died. The screen just went all cabana striped and that was that. I am going to try taking it to the mac store in Crabtree Mall and see if they can get my files off at least. I will not be buying a new computer. That means that Galen and I will have to share mac laptops for a while, which could be dicey. I like to use mine to write and do work. He uses his to do work and (often) to play music. We have a PC laptop (an IBM) that we can both use but we both don't enjoy it as much. We have to have it because our macs or should I say more accurately now, 'the' mac, doesn't interface with our POS (Point Of Sale) cash register system we use at the stores. We do need to get into the system from home occasionally. Galen does it to fix problems without having to go into to the office and I use it to check on inventory levels when deciding about orders, etc. Other than that, we both prefer the mac for the obvious reasons. Now, since Galen spent 7 years working for IBM that is a bit of a sacreligious statement, I guess, but we didn't buy my mac until after he left and then he got his a year later. I think he still feels a bit like a traitor!