Do you recall when you first learned that women pictured in magazines really aren’t flawless? When someone pulled back the curtain and showed you the air-brushing, special lighting, tailored clothing and spray glue that held everything in place?
The more I try to recreate projects I find on Pinterest, the more I feel like only the great and powerful Oz could pull these off – or, at the very least, there must be the crafter’s version of Spanx underneath it all.
Oh, I’m still happily pinning ideas to my 51 boards and still turning to these wizards of crafting for my inspiration; I’ve just modified my expectations and stopped blaming myself for less than perfect replicas. Even better, I’ve begun rising to the challenge and problem-solving some of the immaculate conceptions I wish to recreate.
Case in point: using old slides to decorate a lamp shade. That might have been one of the first projects I pinned and one of the biggest let-downs, when I couldn’t find the “right” shade or “bright enough” bulb to make mine work. I’ve decided that all the projects I’ve seen involving slides must be made with new or very recent slides, or vintage slides that were stored in some cryogenic chamber, because the slides I have – from the late 60s, 70s, and even some 80s – are too faded or dark to see anything when I put a lampshade in between them and the light source.
However, when I attached them to a clear glass vase and put firefly lights inside the vase (and chose and used only the best of the slides I had to work with), I finally got a decent result. These would make neat centerpieces at an anniversary celebration or theme party. but not much more than that, because you can’t leave the battery-operated lights inside running forever and without light it’s just a cylinder covered in black and white squares. Nope, no sugar-coating or secret Spanx here, friends. What I made isn’t art; just a newfangled slideshow.
Project notes:
Want to try this yourself? I used a dab of hot glue (on the top/center of each slide) to adhere the slides to the vase. This worked well – both strong enough to hold them in place and yet still easy to remove (a bonus if your rows begin to slant and you need to start over or if you want to use the vase for something else in the future). You’ll want to leave space at the top and/or bottom of the vase, so you can pick it up without putting pressure on the slides (note my comment above about them being easy to remove). Because of this, I put a piece of wide black ribbon on the inside of the vase – so you can’t see the battery pack and the wires.