i love lamp

A long, long time ago (last Christmas to be exact) I bought a brown vase with the intent of turning it into a lamp.  Then, a few weeks later I was strolling through Marshall's home section and found the very same vase (on clearance for $5!), only it was clear instead of brown.  Now I could have matching-but-not-too-matchy-matchy lamps.  Heck yes.

Fast forward to me finding this tutorial for how to make a knockoff lamp shade of this Anthropologie one:

Well Defined Ensemble Lamp (for a mere $388!!!!)

I was sold.  So back in April, after buying 2 lamp kits for Home Depot, 2 shades from Target, and 1 dictionary, I ended up with these bad boys:

Off...

and on!

The lamp kits were $10 each from Home Depot and although I did have to get different size "stoppers" to fit into my vases (which my dad drilled holes into when my parents visited in April), it was super easy to assemble.  The tutorial for the lamp shade was also super easy.  The only thing I did differently was instead of doing random ripped up pieces of paper I used strips (which made mine bubble just a bit instead of laying totally flat, but I tend to like the not-100%-perfect look).  So basically, I made 2 bed side table lamps that I love with this budget breakdown (I had to buy just about everything):

- 2 vases: $13

- 2 lamp kits: $20

- 2 lamp shades: $12

- 1 dictionary: $5

- (I'm not counting those other stoppers we had to get because they were only like 50 cents or something and my dad went to Home Depot without me)

Total cost: $50

Take that Anthropologie.

Oh and one other note: if you decide to do a similar lamp shade, be careful of the pages you choose.  I tried to pick ones that had words that had special meaing (North Carolina, Southeast, and baseball all made the cut) I accidentally included a page that has a word that starts with "chla" and ends with "mydia." Funny how that word and chivalry were on the same page.