Do you have dated lamps? Are you tired of the look? I know I like to change up the look in my household probably way too often, but with a few quick changes, it doesn't take much time or money to change out the look of your accessories.

Here are some easy to do ideas to give a new face to your old lamps.

Lamp Base:

• Paint: You can easily take your lamp and spray on a coat of paint to change out the color. As well, you can purchase faux stone spray texture and make a smooth lamp look like a handmade pottery piece.
• Fabric: For bedrooms or childrens rooms, you can soften the look of a lamp by just taking some scrap fabric and wrapping the lamp base. Take a hot glue gun and adhere the fabric to the bottom of the base, creating pleats as you go around (to leave enough fabric to fully go around the fattest width of the lamp base). Adhere the fabric in the same way at the top of the lamp base. You can take some ribbon and tie it around the neck of the lamp to give it a little whimsy and add a finishing touch.
• Paper Mache: With a bottle of elmers glue and a bowl of newspaper, gift wrap or decorative scrapbook paper soaked in water, you can brush glue on the lamp base and layer on your decorative paper to create a unique look. If you are using newspaper, you can paint it any color after the paper mache dries. Again adding a new look to your lamp.

Lamp Shade:

• Paint: If you like the shape of your existing shade, you can take acrylic paints, dilute with a little water and paint your shade any color you want. The more water added, the lighter the actual color you enhance your shade with.
• Cut outs: You can take a stencil from your craft store and trace the stencil on your lamp shade. Once you trace your design all around your lamp, you can take a pair of sharp scissors (or exacto knife) to cut out each of the stencil shapes.
• Threading: You can take a hole punch, after you carefully measure out the spacing needed to go around the shade (making sure you have equal holes punched above as you do below), then choose a ribbon color you like and thread it through the holes.
• Stamps: You can take a rubber stamp used in craft card designs and stamp it around your shade to give it another unique look. After stamping, you can paint in your stamped design for added color or detail.
• Trim: You can find a multitude of fabric trims at your local fabric store. They can be hot glued to the edge of your lamp shade as well.

These are just a few easy, inexpensive and fun ideas to change out the look of your old or dated lamps. This can be a fun project to do with your children as well, to add a personal touch to their rooms. I hope you have fun trying out this project!