Fabulous find!

So I don't know if your school has laminator drama, but ours has some serious drama when it comes to the laminator.  Until last year teachers were not allowed to use the laminator, you had to turn your stuff in and the media para would laminate when she got a chance and you would get your materials back in around a week.  Not cool!
Last year we began the year being able to laminate ourselves, problem being that most of the teachers did not know how to use it and constantly broke it.  And they never received any training on it.  I knew how to use it from my previous job.  Long story short, after the first week of school we were not allowed to laminate.
This year we have been able to use it ourselves again, but who knows how long that'll last!  Anyways, when I was at Costco, I saw this snazzy little laminator for, get this, $19.99!!!!  It came with a million laminating pouches, thick laminating pouches.
AMAZING investment if your school has laminator drama!

DIY lampshade makeover

I have ways hated florescent lighting and have tried to have as much alternative lighting as possible, but it has been hard to have enough light in my lovely room covered in carpet. On sunny days it is possible to keep the lights off. However this past week we had some gloomy weather. We had one day where I kept the lights off.  Last year my kids did not like the lights off and would ask for them to be turned back on.  This year, my kids are begging for me to keep them off!  So I am very pumped up!  It motivated me to add some additional lighting to our room so that we will use as little fluorescent lighting as possible.
So, on Firday afternoon I ran by IKEA and had some great finds!!  I got two table lamps for $1.99 each and two lampshades for $3 each.  My total was less than $10 for to lamps!   Both the lamps and shades were ugly, hence the price.  So I had to do a makeover.  I had brown polka dot fabric leftover from some other classroom crafting projects and some spray paint.  I spray painted one lamp hot pink and one green.  Then I made over the shades.  I did not do the best job, but they are perfect for the classroom!  I hope my kids are as pumped as I am tomorrow to see these lamps in action!

Here's what I did:

This is the ugly shade from IKEA.

I carefully took the fabric off, which coincidentally dismembered the entire shade.

Next, I traced the shade on my brown fabric (I would have used the fabric I took off the shade, but I ripped both pieces).

Then I cut it out and left a little edge all of the way around for folding over.

Then I hot glues the metal rims back to the shade.

Lastly I used hot glue again and folded the fabric tightly around the shade and...

Here is the finished product!  Next to the before.  Not too bad if I don't say so myself!