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Ryan and I made a filmstrip lamp last night:

We're having A/V Fest tomorrow to make more of them with friends, so we thought we should figure out the process first.

We got the idea off craftster, but the instructions were sort of vague and we had to figure it out on our own. Basically, you start with a GRÖNÖ lamp from Ikea, then make a little slipcover for it by sewing together filmstrips. I got the filmstrips off ebay; they're going really cheap since they're not exactly the bleeding edge of classroom instruction. The lamp here uses strips from a series about ecology and city life from the 70s. Anyway, you sew the strips together by hand, because sewing them by machine does not work. Trust me on this. We tried it. The hand-sewing goes quickly, though, and is a mindless activity and therefore suited to socializing. You can put two strips together (a paperclip helps minimize the rolling problem) and whip them together through the holes on the edges. We used perl cotton. Assuming you haven't sewn them too tightly (ahem) you can then flatten them out so the strips are side-by-side. We're planning to put fray-check over the knots at the top and bottom so we can cut the ends off tightly without losing the knots. It takes twelve strips to make a cover, three for each side. We found that if you leave a little extra filmstrip above the sewn part, it will curl over and the edges will look nice. We found that out by not really doing it on purpose, which is why this is a prototype.

I have filmstrips on various topics, including handtool safety, building codes, childcare, a weird cartoon one about being pregnant, marriage, and architechture. Also a biblical one which is going to be my new desk lamp.

After the craft fest, we will go to the San Mateo Country Fair to see Hookslide and boggle at the vast variety of things that can be deep-fried.
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