Overtly and Overly Crafty: A $0 Lampshade Makeover

Just before Tiffany visited, I found and installed the lampshade on the bedside lamp in the guest room.  I also noticed it was pretty grungy.  Blech.  Then a couple of days ago I saw a pin on pinterest that gave me the idea of covering it with fabric I already had.  

It's a funny little lamp, but I like the square base and it's small enough to fit on the tiny bedside table in there.

Enter green burlap.  As much help as pinterest is, it has also nearly ruined burlap for me because it's just everywhere for everything.  I'm glad I made window and shower curtains of it a few years ago to mostly satisfy my urge to make things out of it.  I had picked up this yard-or-so of the green from the remnant bin at least a year ago.

I "rolled" the shade around on the burlap to get a basic shape, then cut it out.  I decided to utilize the selvedge to finish off the wrap.

I used spray adhesive on the shade, started the wrap at the seam on the shade, leaving the selvedge to overlap at the end.  Then I cut off the extra at the end.

Next I cut the extra off the top and bottom, but left some of the extra on each end of the selvedge. so it would look tidy after gluing it down.

I thought about trying to trim off that little odd bit in the selvedge, but I liked the little bit of quirkiness it added.  It is burlap after all and just making it green doesn't make it fancy.  But what to trim it with?  Before heading off to the store, of course I had to look in my trims bin.  Did I find what I was looking for?  No.  Did I find something ridiculous?  Yes, I did.

Again I started at the same seam and used Fabri-Tac long both top and bottom of the tape and laid the dingle balls over the lip of the shade so their weight would hold up the trim while the glue dried (which was very quickly).

Once I got to the corner, I cut the tape with enough extra to fold over about 3/8", glued down that hem and then the last bit and held it with my fingers until it dried.  But what about the top?  I'd have liked to have found something in a similar blue as in this trim, but didn't find anything in the bin.  I'd have settled for the pink, even, but no dice there, either.

Enter green leaf trim that has been in every trim stash I've had in my life... including my mom's.  So, on it went.  Again with Fabri-Tac and again matching the other seam; this trim didn't require making a hem and the pattern matched up just right!  (not pictured, sorry about that)

This is not the guestroom, it's the mudroom.  All the photos were taken here on the deep freeze or on the dining room table.

Now that's a lamp that looks like it's had one heckuva good time at one crazy-wild party!  Life is too short to take even lampshades seriously and to not embrace ridiculousness.

Oh, yeah.  All those colors are in the ridiculous fabric I have for the guest room window treatments.