I’m in the final stages of finishing (is anything really ever finished?) my living room makeover.  The fireplace is the focal point, and I am trying to downplay the huge TV over it.  I have really liked these lamps flanking the TV on the mantel, but the lampshades have not yet come up to speed.  Here is what they looked like before I started futzing with them.

note trusty assistant on left;)

I went back and forth between black and cream lampshades.  They were $17 from Ikea, so it wasn’t like choosing between a Chagall and a Picasso.  I settled on cream because I like the warm glow, but the plainness of them was bugging me.

love the glow

They needed to be dolled up somehow.  I glued some trim on there thinking it was the perfect fix, and then I didn’t like it!  Maybe it was the trim I chose, who knows but they still were not working!

adding trim doesn't always fix matters

So then I thought GLITTER!  A bit of glitter makes anything better, and hadn’t I seen Martha Stewart glitter the inside of a lampshade once?  Yes, here!  Here are the itty bitty teeny tiny sconce covering lampshades that Martha glittered, note the slight variance in size between these and the honking lampshades I was determined to glitter:

from Martha Stewart

So.  Initially I was going to glitter the inside of the black shades with red, I love the warm glow the inside of a lampshade gives off when it is red or pink.  I would love to glitter the insides of the cream ones, but the color of the glitter would show through and I didn’t want big pink lampshades in my living room, although there is nothing wrong with a huge pink lampshade just not the look I was going for in my living room.   So, I got out my big black lampshades and pulled some shades from my glitter color library and the green called out to me, as often green does.;)  And away we went.

gorgeous green and sparkly!

Here are a series of video clips documenting my glitter escapades:

Great Lamp Glitter Project part 1

Great Lampshade Glitter Project part 2

Great Lampshade Glitter Project part 3

Great Lampshade Glitter Project part 4

Great Lampshade Glitter Project part 5 COMPLETED!

The final result:

loves me some glitter

Closeup on the inside of the lampshade:

tinsel glitter for texture

And here is a closeup on the type of glitter I used, tinsel glitter:

Martha knows best

And the final product!  On to the next project!!!  These look so good I am all up in the insides of all of the lampshades in my house trying to resist myself from glittering the whole lot of them.