DIY: Disguise a generic ceiling light

By Chelsea



I'm telling you, if we get one more snow I may resort to painting all our interior walls. When I'm not playing hide & seek with the kids, (which, if you find a good hiding spot, is a great way to get a few minutes of peace and quiet), building train tracks, baking banana bread, changing baby doll clothes, getting chased by 'dinosaurs', and racing matchbox cars, (all of which barely cover the chunk of morning BEFORE breakfast), I've been finding some cool inside projects that I may never have discovered if we weren't snowed in!

This week it was disguising a light. Not a horribly ugly light, but the cheap, generic kind that most builders install. We've all seen these before:

It's not that I consider these an eyesore, but I wanted to present a very easy idea for disguising these simple globes with something a little more modern and unique. This would be a great project for a renter since it doesn't involve removing the light fixture and dealing with wires, etc. We're simply making a little 'disguise'!

To make this simple disguise I just used this black metal fruit basket, (or something), from the thrift store. Not sure exactly what it is, except that I see these all the time at yard sales, thrift stores and the like.

Then I wound it all up in twine.

Almost finished!

Thanks to the little hooks on three of the sides, I just hammered some small wall staples into the ceiling and hung it by the hooks!

Easy to put up, easy to take down. I wish something like this had occurred to me during our apartment years! 

We had two more of these ceiling lights in our home when we moved in - one above the sink in our kitchen, and another in a nook in our basement. Here's what we did in those areas:

Kitchen:

Basement:

In those cases we replaced the lights completely with yard sale finds. Here's the post I wrote on how to replace lights, (written for wire wimps like me)!

I love simple ideas like today's 'disguise' for quick fixes, (whether a permanent solution is permit-able or not). Definitely a renter-worthy project!

Thank you so much for stopping by!

~Chelsea