My Bright Idea

A friend of mine recently introduced me to a new favorite website, Pinterest. There are days that I find myself looking and pinning and dreaming and wishing. There are other days that the things I've pinned actually inspire me to do something fun and new. This was one of those days.

I've been finding myself staring at my kitchen chandelier, thinking that it needs to be changed for a while now. I wanted to get rid of the brass (and possibly also the dust) and replace it with something that I liked better.

I forgot to take pictures of the fixture before I got it taken down, so here's when I remembered to start documenting my project with photos.


Funny, after taking it down, dusting it, and cleaning it up good, it doesn't look half as awful as it did before...


...It took quite a bit of brain power to figure out how to hang this up outside so I could paint all sides of it, and keep the chickens from trying to eat it at the same time. I settled for hanging it from the kids swing set. Worked like a charm!

Almost immediately, I fell in love with the new color. Had my neighbors not moved the week before, they probably would have enjoyed watching me spray and grin, and spray and grin.

In this picture, you notice how the paint self-dimples to make it's own hammered finish. I've never enjoyed watching paint dry more than I did this day!

After finishing the paint job, waiting for it to completely dry, I decided to try an effect that I saw on Pinterest to make the white plastic tubes look just a little bit more like real candles. I wasn't sure I could pull it off, so I practiced drizzling hot glue down the sides of a toilet paper tube before I committed. Yes, the kids thought I was crazy. Please don't confirm their suspicions for a few more years. ;)

I was still a little wary, but jumped in with the glue gun anyway. Seriously, this chandelier has been bothering me so long that I didn't think I could make it look any worse.

I was pretty happy with the results, just adding the glue, but after a few coats of white spray paint, I was feeling pretty impressed with myself.

This is the can of Rust-oleum hammered finish spray paint that I used. Sometimes I tend to get carried away with things when I love the results of the first attempt. We'll see how many other pieces of random things in my house end up covered with this paint. (Yes kids, I know that this one is totally out of order. I tried three times to move it where I wanted it, and when it didn't work, I moved on so that this post would actually get finished.)

Anyway, here's a closeup of one finished arm of the fixture, to show the dripping "wax" detail. Have I mentioned I love it?!

And here's a similar picture with the light actually turned on. (Nope, can't look at this picture without seeing the blurry white spot on the bottom and wondering where that ghost came from! Gotta stop watching scary movies...)



And here's the entire finished project. I can't stop looking at it. That could have something to do with it's proximity to my computer chair... but whatever!


I am thrilled with the results, but wonder if I should try something more bold next time. I think Hannah's room would look pretty cool with a bright red chandelier, blinged out with crystals. Hopefully someone else got tired of their old brass fixture, and sent it to the DI for me to play with.

As I finish up this post, and look at the final picture, I can't help but wonder what that wooden curtain rod would look like with a coat of hammered finish brown paint...