In which Melanie makes Christmas shades

It's been a couple weeks since I've posted - between birthdays and Thankgiving, I've been swamped! Luckily however, I did manage to get a couple things finished over that time so I've got some new stuff! And what better way to start out December than to show a holiday project! Now is the time when everyone is starting to do their Christmas decorating, and over Thanksgiving weekend my mother-in-law had the idea to make slipcovers for the shades on her chandelier. She had looked into replacing them for the Holidays with something more Christmas-y but what she was looking for cost about $15 per shade, and there are 15 shades on her chandelier! So we went to the craft store and got some fabric and some seam tape. Yes that's right - seam tape. So if you can iron, you can do this! Here is her chandelier before:

It's missing a shade in this picture because I had already taken it down to start making a pattern. All I did was roll it across a piece of newspaper as I traced the edges so that I could get the natural curve of the shade. I cut that out and fit it to the shade, and wound up with something like this:

After cutting it out I made small cuts along the curved edges so that I could iron in a nice smooth curved seam.

And then I ironed... and ironed... and ironed some more! Have I mentioned there were 15 of them? Thats right, 15! I ironed the top and bottom edges and then put some of the seam tape in and ironed that down. Then I ironed a side seam, put some tape there and ironed it down so that i was in the shape of the shade. I hade to test each one as I went to be sure it was exactly the right size.

Maybe I should mention that ironing is one of my leaste favorite things ever. But thats ok! They came out looking really cute!

How very festive! Ok I know my directions for making these was a little vague, but I forgot to take more pictures as I was making them. If anyone wants to give this a try and needs more help just let me know!