Dying Lampshades

A few weeks back now I saw a project that Jenny over at Little Green Notebook attempted. 

She had some drum shades that she found at Target and wanted to take them from white to something more functional for one of her rooms.

I found the dye - Procion MX - at an art store online and the order was placed!  

I had this lampshade lying around...  

Well, not really, it's actually been in use in the guest bedroom for quite sometime now. 

Seen here.

But I was going to use this one before I decided to tackle the actual shades I will be dying for our living room.  They are all white, but I figured I'd test it out first to see how I liked it on a shade that I'm pretty sure I found at Goodwill for $2.99 instead of the ones that came with my Home Goods Lamps!

So I mixed up the dye with some water... Like Jenny did.  Although, the directions do say to use this powder soda ash that I ordered.  I opted for water and dye.  I'm impatient.

The color was called Pearl Gray.

Here's the middle of the process. 

Not too bad.

Here it looks more brown than in real life at this point.

And here's the final lampshade. 

I'm OK with it for the guest bedroom although, I do think it will get replaced. 

It has more of a purple tone that I would have hoped for.  I really wanted GRAY!!!

Oh well, you win some you lose some, right?!

It'll live like this in the guest bedroom like this for a while...

But I do think I'll tackle this again soon.  And probably with another "tester" lampshade that can just be tossed out if I don't like the color.  If I do, then I'll make sure I've made enough dye to use on my lampshades for the living room! 

And I think I'll try to follow the directions entirely this time!