I’ve been decorating my friend Nancy’s bedroom, and we’re trying to be creative with our decorating ideas and not spend too much money. When it came time to look at the ceiling light, my first thought was to chuck it and buy a new one. Because, really, look at that thing. But after shopping around, I decided that the best course was to give it a DIY makeover. What’s the worse thing that could happen, right? If we didn’t like it, we’d just go back to square one and buy a new fixture. Well, thanks to my Sizzix Big Shot machine and some chandelier beads, I think it turned out great.

First, I removed the light fixture from the ceiling.

Then I made stencils using my Sizzix Big Shot Machine. I bought a Decorative Accent die from Sizzix on eBay, and ran it through the machine with some contact paper. I thought the contact paper would make good stencils because they would be adhesive, but still easily removable. I saved all the die cuts and used the negative portions for the stencils.

Then I peeled the backing from the contact paper stencils and adhered them to the light fixture. It was kind of challenging to make the stencils lie flat because the light fixture is rounded. I just pressed really hard to get all the air bubbles out. I also eyeballed the design.

Next, I used a foam stencil brush to paint on some silver metallic acrylic paint. I waited until the paint dried before removing the stencils, but that didn’t go too well because the paint dried on the stencils, and when I pulled off the stencils, some of the paint came off with them. So next time, I would remove the stencils while the paint was still wet. I like the imperfections, though. (One of my secrets: always act like you meant it to be that way.)

I bought some chandelier beads at chandelierparts.com. The light fixture already had 3 points where screws held the fixture, so I just used those screws to swag the beads around. I also had some beaded trim in my studio I use for votives and floral arrangements, so I wrapped some of that around the upper base of the light. Overall, this project cost about $40. Much better than the $200+ it would have cost to buy a new light fixture.