Tweaking Our New Light

Okay, so we put a new light up in our kitchen, and I even went to Aubuchon to get brighter bulbs, and it still wasn’t quite bright enough. I could have put 100W bulbs in, but the thought of using so much juice bothered me, so I compromised a bit and went with 75W bulbs. They weren’t that bright, either, at least not enough, and we figured out what the problem was.

Now first off, I would have preferred to have used fluorescent bulbs, but we have a dimmer, and that's a big no-no because most fluorescent bulbs are not compatible with dimmers. Also, we have a dark house, and want to have brightness in certain places that we just can’t get with fluorescent bulbs. Let’s face it, the light from those things is not as nice. We have them virtually everywhere else in the house, except for a couple of places, including the kitchen and dining table.

Another issue is that because the dome for the light is not reflective, regular bulbs sort of diffuse the light throughout the room instead of directing to the table, where we want it. The solution (which I’m sure my Mentor and JH and his magic bag of tools are already thinking of) is to use a flood bulb. Sure, they’re not as pretty, but they sure do the trick, and they have all sorts of energy efficient bulbs out there. They even have these slick LED bulbs that only cost about $40. I bought a case of them... just kidding.

Either way, I had to toy around with flood bulbs, as well. We have a bunch of them because we have recessed flood lights throughout the downstairs and I replaced all of them with fluorescent flood bulbs. Some are way too bright and harsh, while other are too dim. We finally settled on the 75W indoor flood, and it works beautifully. Plus, we can dim it, which makes everything all right, for now.

Thanks for reading.