I have to say that while being here I’ve learned to appreciate my mom more than I ever had before. Living in a community not only means that we get to eat together, learn Spanish together, laugh together, and cry together, we also get to care for a house together. But caring for a house is a lot more work than I thought, and it’s not just because of the Chimbote dust. Sweeping never ends, dishes never end, dusting never ends, bathrooms are never perfectly clean, the table is never cleared off for more than five minutes, etc., etc., etc. BUT as a house of hospitality it’s also a lot of fun – because cleaning isn’t something we do only for ourselves, but for our friends, neighbors, and coworkers to whom we open our home. Our community goal of participating in the culture of hospitality that surrounds us also inspires us to creatively make our home a more inviting, comfortable place. Thus leading to the reason for the title of this blog post…
One of those ideas was sparked by Katie, who has been set on getting a lamp for our living room for several weeks now. Finally one afternoon she and I went downtown to price some lamps, and discovered the neither the styles available nor their corresponding prices gelled with our needs. So I said Katie, I think we can just build a lamp!
With a little help from the internet to brush up my electrical skills and some perusing around the house to find discarded or unneeded objects, we did it! Our living room is now graced with a beautiful (dare I say?), quirky, symbolic lamp make with (almost) completely recycled materials. And I only blew the power out once J Definitely a purple ribbon, if not best of show ;) Here’s a little description, not for bragging purposes, but to maybe inspire you to make something cool out of old junk that’s lying around!
We started by buying the necessary electrical parts for a lamp – the light socket, cord, and plug – which in the U.S. can be bought in a lamp kit but here are sold individually. We also bought a small piece of plastic tubing, some wire, and super glue. Then we identified a cool-looking plastic bottle from our extensive collection of bottles waiting to be recycled. The base of the lamp was constructed by fitting the tube from the neck of the bottle to the bottom corner, stringing the cord through it, and attaching the light socket on top. We filled around the tube with sand that Kelli retrieved from a sand dune just down the road and… complete! You can fill the inside with other little things as well… we added around the top the words, “Ustedes son la luz del mundo,” which means “You are the light of the world,” from the Gospel of Matthew. 
Now for the lamp shade. We used two wire hangers and bent them into squares, then attached them at the corners with a second plastic bottle, cut into strips. This I first tried to cover with tissue paper and then decorate with used matches (we have a gas stove), but it was a little sub-par quality. So we thought a little harder and came up with using an old T-shirt, which in our case ended up being my bilingual Incarnate Word Missionaries shirt, which was too big for me anyway! A little cutting (don’t take for granted your rotary cutter – children’s scissors make the job a little more frustrating!) and sewing (also don’t take for granted your sewing machine!) led to the (almost) perfectly-fitted lampshade cover. To attach the lampshade, we wrapped wire around the bottom lampshade frame and looped it to wrap around the neck of the bottle. Voilà! And it’s even IWM-themed J Here you can pictures of the front and back… the fact that both designs ended up being centered was pure luck! Yay for recycled products!
Another post to come soon to share about our Christmas celebrations… I wish you all a very joyful and peaceful Christmas! Another opportunity to realize how truly BLESSED we are that our God chose to come to the earth and be one of us… God doesn’t want to be far away and scary. In the beginning God was the word, but the word was made FLESH in order to be closer to us. I pray that this year’s celebration truly allows you to feel that closeness.
Thanks for reading! I would love to hear from each and every one of you J Chau!
