Reading by Lamp Light

I named this post "Reading by Lamp Light", I should have added "sort of".  Our power goes out a lot here in the styx of Idaho so we have quite a few Colman lanterns for back up lighting, plus a few here and there just for looks.  After going to the Farm Chicks this year I had an idea of what I wanted to do with one, but didn't want to sacrifice one we already had in case it didn't work out.  Garage sale to the rescue!  I found this one (sorry, no before pics) for 75 cents, so no problem tearing it apart.

I knew it could be great turned into a lamp with an Edison bulb, so one really gloomy wet day my husband worked on it.  He started by taking off the broken globe and then worked on deconstructing it.  I took a break from trying to cut down a chair cushion (an upcoming post) to see how it was going.  He had taken off the piece where you pump it up and was trying to get all of the solder and stuff out.  Things weren't going so well, so I said I was going to go back to the house and cuss at my own project.  Awhile later I went back over to check on progress.  He had found a small outdoor entry light laying around that he wired in.  It needed a better cord, and a cool filament bulb, and voila...a unique lamp that really fits in our family room.  Dean said that we had to keep this because he would have to charge $800 for all the work he put into it. 

Now on to the magazine rack.  Actually this was done about a month ago, but I guess it was just waiting for a cool lamp to show it off.  Here's what it looked like when I brought it home from a garage sale for $5.

Not bad, a little beat up but I was planning on painting it anyhow.  My plan was to sell it, but when I looked at the lines it kind of matched another one we had, and looked a lot better then the '90s Duncan Phyfe knock off I had in there.  The top was a little warped so my husband planed some boards, glued them together, cut them out, routered the edge and attached it to the top.  Ain't he handy!!

 

Here it is all painted and already well used.

I'll be linking up at:

funky junk interiors
coastal charm  

miss mustard seed.