Make A Fabric Pom-Pom Lightshade

When I made 'tissue paper pom-poms' I hung one from a hook above our dinner table. I loved the way it looked so much that I left it there for several weeks. A friend commented on how much they liked my new 'light fitting', I then explained to them that it was just a tissue paper decoration.but it got me thinking - is there some way I could make a lamp/light shade that would look similar to the tissue pom-pom?

This project is the result and I'm really happy with it, you can hang the lantern as a lightshade (for safety, use an energy-saving bulb which gives plenty of light but won't get too hot) or just hang from a length of ribbon as a decoration. A word of warning though, this is not a difficult project but it is time consuming, and I went through more fabric and glue than I was expecting.I still love my fabric lightshade though, so the time & expense was definitely worth it.

What to do

1. Following the instructions, assemble the paper lantern.

2. Draw a 3 inch circle on some card/cereal box and cut out (this is your template).

3. Using the template, draw circles on the back of your fabric (you will need a lot of circles, for my 14 inch paper lantern I needed 639 circles in total, but I cut them in batches of about 100).

4. Cut out the fabric circles (cut just inside the drawn lines so as to remove the pen marks).

**TOP TIP - Be careful with hot melt glue as the glue and the guns nozzle tip are very hot - TOP TIP**

5. Squirt a small blob of glue in the centre of the front of a fabric circle and fold in half, pressing with your finger at the point where the glue is (making a semi-circle).

6. Squirt a small blob of glue at the centre fold and then fold the semi-circle in half, pressing with your finger at the point where the glue is (making a quarter-circle rosette).

7. Place your thumb & forefinger inside the rosette and then squirt a small blob of glue in the open centre section, press together to close.

8. Repeat steps 5-7 until you have made a whole bunch of rosettes (I made about 100 at a time).

9. Stick the rosettes to the paper lantern with a dollop of glue and gently press into place.

**TOP TIP - To help cover small gaps you can join the rosettes together with a small blob of glue - TOP TIP**

10. Continue making rosettes and gluing them to the lantern until it is completely covered. Check the overall appearance as you go, filling in any gaps with extra rosettes.

11. If you are using the 'fabric pom-pom lightshade' as a hanging decoration then tie a length of ribbon to the wire inner section of the lantern and hang-up. Whereas if you are using the pom-pom as a lightshade, then attach to your light fitting according to the lanterns instructions.

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