What’s wrong with this picture? It’s another Becky D.I.Y. Disaster!

I’ve decided to reveal my complete lack of skills when it comes to Do-It-Yourself to you, because at least a few of you seem to find it funny. I read ReadyMade, I come up with all kinds of overambitious ideas, and when I go to execute, the results are laughable. I finally bought some new sconce/chandelier lampshades at RE-Store the other day (that place is AWESOME!) for $2.95 each, new in package (I also picked up some earplugs for my neighbor’s weekly two hour leaf blowing extravaganzas, for ten cents each). I absolutely adore the print on this pair I bought at IKEA, but like everything else I have ever bought there, they were a near miss – while my sconces require clip shades, this was one of those weird shades with a ring that fits below the bulb, and probably only works on lights from IKEA. Inspired by IKEAHacker, I figured it would be an easy fix. For some reason I felt sure this involved stolen coffee stirrers from the coffeeshop and packaging tape.

(Pardon the D.I.Y. Photoshopping Above) By the way, these stayed like this for about a year. They were actually straight for about a month or so, but because they were at the top of the stairs, this was the main view of my handiwork I had of at least one of them as I looked up. Let’s get one more look at how this was working out:

Usually I have a hard time living with things that are crooked, but this was such a lost cause and I hate bare bulbs so much that I just ignored it. Do you have anything around the house like this that you’ve just let go forever?