Skating Agility
Being able to shrug off forecheckers and dance through a defensive system will go a long way toward creating quality-scoring opportunities. Shifty skaters have to put in hours of practice on their quick turning ability in order to make it look seamless. For a basic drill that helps with skating agility, put four cones on the ice, one on each blue line, one on the red line, and one at the far end faceoff circle —each staggered to be several feet to the left and right of one another. Begin at the top of the other faceoff circle, skating down and crossing over to skate back up the middle. Maneuver around each cone on the center ice lines, crossing from left to right, then circle around the cone at the opposite faceoff circle. Perform the drill both with and without the puck to get a better feel for acceleration as well as stickhandling.

Shooting
You miss 100 percent of the shots you never take, said Gretzky, which is why a player’s shot is one of his best attributes in hockey. Whenever possible, practice your shot with someone feeding you pucks so that you can develop soft hands and catch passes, but several solo drills can give you a killer release. The most practical shooting drill is also the most simple: Take as many pucks as possible at every angle in the offensive zone and aim for the cross bar of the net since the red paint provides a solid shooting guide. After shooting from every spot on the ice — in the slot, at the faceoff dot, from the side boards, and from the point — start to aim slightly lower, just beneath the crossbar, so that you can hit the shot right where the goalie can’t stop it. Follow the example of 60-goal scorer Steven Stamkos and shoot a lot: Stamkos credits his lethal release to shooting 300 to 400 pucks a day.

Stickhandling
The paint on a rink surface will go a long way toward helping a player stickhandle through traffic. A backyard rink may not have the same complex paint job as an NHL rink, but even a single red line allows you to train your stickhandling by passing the puck over each side of the line. Add cones on either side of a paint line to practice pulling the puck in between obstacles; practicing this in the faceoff circle provides the benefit of stickhandling while turning and while moving toward a new point on the ice. Put a cone in front of the net to practice toe drags, pulling the puck from the tip of the blade to the heel of the stick in order to evade a poke check and unleash a deadly snapshot on an unsuspecting goalie.

Passing
Drill with a buddy to send a pass over all parts of the ice. Start a simple drill with both players behind the net and skate upward, passing the puck at each go, alternating between long and short passing. Work on saucer passing to elevate the puck when farther away and backhand passing when closer. Have one player skate ahead to catch a breakout pass, then pivot and wait for the other player to reach the attacking zone before passing. Once both players are in the attacking zone, lengthen short passes until both players are near to the net on either side so that the goalie must commit to one side of the net or the other.

About the author: Erin Wozniak is the Director of Marketing at Pro Stock Hockey , an online supplier of pro stock hockey equipment. Erin is a devoted Blackhawks fan and is passionate about hockey. Pro Stock Hockey offers products including skates, protective equipment, hockey sticks and more.

Hockey is full of famous trophies, each carrying with them an encyclopedia of history, memories, and stories. Now you can add another to the list – the championship trophies presented to the division winners of the Maine Pond Hockey Classic, which take place February 12-14 in Sydney, Maine.

“After skating your heart out all weekend long, some people might be happy taking home a shiny plastic hockey player on top of a small piece of marble and colorful plastic tube… at the Maine Pond Hockey Classic we find that unacceptable. After battling the elements and whatever ice conditions Mother Nature allows for the weekend you deserve more, much more!”

The unique trophy starts with a number of broken and discarded sticks, which are fused together by Maine-based Reynolds Custom Woodworks. The sticks are then cut into the shape of Maine and applied to a plaque for display. The end result is a one-of-a-kind memento of your weekend of digging in the corners and grinding through the cold – as well as all the memories made along the way.

The Maine Pond Hockey Classic is now in its 4th year, with proceeds going towards the Alfond Youth Center in Waterville, Maine. For more information or to register (registration closes at midnight tonight), visit http://www.mainepondhockey.org.

Richard Wood, Springfield College professor by day and hockey dad by night (and early weekend morning), was sitting with some friends at the Vermont Pond Hockey Classic when the group had an idea. Create a pond hockey tournament on the same site, the idyllic Lake Morey Resort, only have it be exclusively for kids. Last February, that vision became a reality.

33 teams participated in the first annual New England Youth Pond Hockey Jamboree in February 2015. The response and feedback was tremendous, proving that youth pond hockey can be a viable event.

“Players loved it, would be the first tournament they would want to return to. Parents thought it was an incredible experience and many personally thanked me for signing us up.”

“A huge thank you to you and your committee for hosting and extremely well run tournament! I honestly did not have one complaint / concern from our coaches, managers, or families that attended.”

“My son said it was the best weekend of his life.”

And the numbers agree:

This year, in addition to the on-ice action, organizers have added a number of off-ice activities as well. During registration on Friday night (February 19th), guitarist Jason Cann will entertain the crowd, as will magician Nick Blais, who specializes in face-to-face magic. The Pond Hockey documentary will air in the movie theater at 7pm. On Saturday, after the on-ice action has subsided for the day, Family Trivia will take place at 7:30pm. Throughout the weekend, there will be a knee hockey zone, Wii hockey on the big screen, sleigh rides, ice fishing, and of course, Lake Morey Resort’s famed 4.5-mile skating loop. Yes, it’s a pond hockey jamboree at the heart. But calling it a fun-as-heck long weekend full of awesome family activities isn’t far from the truth.

So while the tournament is booked up for this year, certainly like their Facebook Page and get your mouse finger ready to join the fray in 2017. And of course, there’s always room for tournament sponsors, volunteers, or spectators. To get more information or to reach out to the organizers, please visit the event’s website, http://wtmhockey.org/Page.asp?n=89469&org=WTMHOCKEY.

But not this year. Not if I can help it.

If you have hockey people in your life, then you’re going to make this the best. holiday. season. EVER. If you’re like most people, you have no idea what hockey people want. And it’s not your fault — nobody’s ever told you what hockey people want. But I’m about to.

Below you’ll find a handful of the latest, greatest, coolest, interestingest, MOST OUTDOOR HOCKEY-RELATED gifts you’ve ever seen. You will purchase them. And you will blow their minds.

Note – Click the links or photos to be taken directly to a product page.

If you’re buying for the kids…

	Ben and Lucy Play Pond Hockey Hockey kids will love it because of the festive, colorful illustrations and rhythmic text. Hockey parents will love it because it makes bedtime that much easier. Authored by Andrew Sherburne and Tommy Haines, makers of the Pond Hockeydocumentary, Ben and Lucy Play Pond Hockey is the perfect way to introduce the hockey child in your life to the rituals of the outdoor game. See our review here.
	Hockey Guys by Kaskey Kids My oldest got his first set of Hockey Guys back in 2008 when he was two, and now that we have twins, we’ve probably gone through a half-dozen sets (because they travel with us everywhere and we lose some). We’ve also added in their Football Guys, Soccer Guys, and Baseball Guys…as well as their NHL-themed Hockey Guys. This is a great toy to help develop creativity as there are no rules and no structure (kinda like pond hockey!) As a hockey coach, we’ve even brought the whole set up to the tournament hotel and helped explain d-zone coverage. Easily one of my favorite hockey-related products.
	OYO NHL Minifigure Backyard Rink Set It’s a minifigure! It’s a backyard rink! It’s the NHL! In other words…it’s perfect! OYO makes tons of minifigs that work with Lego sets, so this NHL backyard rink kit is only the tip of the iceberg if your little one has a ton of lego sets already. Sidney Crosby against Darth Vader in a game of shinny? MAKE IT HAPPEN. Tuukka Rask stopping Wild Style from the Lego Movie in a shootout? DONE. OYO makes these backyard rink kits for a number of teams, and there are dozens of individual players and team zambonis also available.

If you’re buying for the backyard rink master in your life…

	Backyard Ice Rink: A Step-by-Step Guide for Building Your Own Hockey Rink at Home You didn’t think we’d leave out our own book, did you? Aimed for the new rink builder and veteran rink master alike, Backyard Ice Rink gives you all the tools and tricks you need to put a little slice of frozen heaven in your backyard. Don’t take it from me, check out the reviews too: “Backyard Ice Rink, by Joe Proulx is more than a step-by-step guide to building an ice rink in your backyard. The book will motivate, caution, prepare, and entertain…and convince the reader that the idea of building and maintaining a frozen slab of ice in a backyard is perfectly reasonable and achievable. I have built my own rink for 9 consecutive winters and wish I had as thorough a resource as this when starting out.”
	Home Ice: Reflections on Backyard Rinks and Frozen Ponds I would need four hands to count the rink builders I know who built their first rink as a direct result of this book. Jack Falla was, and remains today, a backyard rink legend. His Bacon Street Omni was a local gathering place, but his books stretched far outside the city limits of Natick MA, and even years after his untimely passing, his words continue to inspire. If someone you know and love builds a backyard rink, they need Home Ice. Simple as that.
	A gift card to their favorite rink parts/liner store This one shows that you think outside the box and truly know your giftee. If someone gave me one of these I’d be psyched that they gave so much thought to their gift. A number of backyard rink parts companies do the gift card thing, and some even allow you to email the gift instantly (if you waited to long to have it shipped). Click here to order a gift card from Nicerink, and click here to order from Iron Sleek. If your recipient orders their liner or parts from somewhere else, inquire about a gift card there!
	A New Rink Shovel It might sound cheesy and practical, but take it from a rinkbuilder – you can never have too many good shovels! I’m partial to the SnowPusherLite, but Amazon and your local hardware store will carry any number of nice shovels. I love the wide ones, and shovels get bonus points when they have rubberized edges to act as squeegees. It may be tough to wrap, but it’s a great gift for someone who really puts the work in maintaining your family’s rink.
	The Comet Puck A neat little stocking stuffer, the Comet Puck is the same size and weight of a normal puck, but uses a replaceable lithium coin cell battery and a tiny LED to create a bright little biscuit. Perfect for rinks and ponds, the puck is slapshot resistant – comet bombs away!

If you’re buying for the pond hockey fanatic…

Pond Hockey: Frozen Moments The team that brought you the Pond Hockey documentary is back, this time with some coffee table candy. They engaged incredibly talented photographer Nic Wynia and tasked him with taking as many photographs of outdoor hockey as he could. He traveled around North America and when he returned, the team got to work sorting through the shots. The end result is an instant classic, and another outdoor hockey success for the guys at Northland Films. The book ships on December 1st, so show them how in touch you are with the outdoor hockey culture and get them this great new release!

Sniper’s Edge Hockey Pass Master Chances are your favorite hockey player may already have some sort of passing rebounder. And for the most part, they’re great. What makes this one different? That you can actually use it on ice! Most rebounders attach to shooting pads, which are great for use in the garage or driveway. But on the backyard rink or pond, they’re unusable. Enter the Sniper’s Edge Pass Master. This heavy-duty steel triangle has rubber bands on three sides and removable steel pegs along the bottom for use on actual ice. Bring it to the rink or pond and it’s like having another person on the ice with you.

Have any other ideas? Post ’em in the comments below!

Please see our Affiliate Disclosure for information about the links contained in this post.

After consecutive blizzards dropped record amounts of snow in New England, the ice on Messalonskee Lake became compromised and Guerette and Co decided to cancel last year’s Maine Pond Hockey Classic.

“Last year was tough, there were a lot of people counting on us to put this event on, from players to volunteers to community partners.” said Guerette. “I personally felt like we let a lot of people down; after all, it’s hard to explain to everyone that you have to cancel a winter event because we basically had ‘too much winter,’ it just sounds ridiculous.”

Guerette and his team regrouped in the spring and planned to not only host the event in 2016, but to make it bigger and better. This year’s event, which will be held on February 12th – 14th at the Snow Pond Center for the Arts on Snow Pond (Messalonskee Lake) in Sidney, Maine, looks to host upwards of 60 teams. To drum up interest, Guerette and his team even produced a series of commercials, seen below.

“We had planned many great improvements to the tournament, a new tournament site [Snow Pond Center for the Arts] with great amenities, beer garden, and off-ice activities. All of the groundwork has been laid for those improvements and we can hit the ground running this year.”

Tournament organizers point out that the Snow Pond Center for the Arts is a great location for the tournament. “When you are hosting players from far away, you want to make sure you think of the entire player experience. This location provides a lot of amenities,” said Bert Languet, Volunteer Director of Event Operations, “we will have lots of parking, drive on access to the ice, and heated indoor space for players between games.” Since inception, the Maine Pond Hockey Classic players has hosted hundreds of hockey players from around the Northeast and even attracted players from as far away as Washington DC and Arizona.

The Maine Pond Hockey Classic aims to provide a festival like atmosphere for players and spectators. The tournament site will contain 6 or more rinks, beer garden, fire pits, food vendors and anything else tournament organizers can add to the mix. “We have plans for a few skills competitions for players between games like shooting and skating drills; we also have plans for leisure games as well,” said Guerette.

The Maine Pond Hockey Classic offers 7 divisions from players of different ages and ability levels; including, Open “A”, Open “B”, Women’s, COED, Recreational, 40+, and a “College” Division. Each division winner will receive a prize pack including complimentary entry to the following year’s tournament, Championship Sweatshirts, and a very unique trophy that features the State of Maine cut out from old hockey sticks. “We like having a trophy that you won’t see anywhere else; besides, it really wouldn’t be a great representation of Maine if we didn’t take something old and discarded and turn it into something awesome,” said Guerette.

The Maine Pond Hockey Classic is an annual fundraising tournament supporting the Boys & Girls Clubs and YMCA of Greater Waterville. Registration opened on October 1, 2015 for the 2016 Maine Pond Hockey Classic, interested teams must register prior to January 12, 2016. Note that the registration fee increases from $445 to $495 on December 1st. Each team plays three pool play games for seeding followed by a single elimination tournament. Tourney games are played 4 on 4 without goalies or on ice officials, and each team is allowed to have up to 7 players on their roster.

More information can be found on the tournament website at www.mainepondhockey.org. The tournament can on Facebook at www.facebook.com/mainepondhockey, or on twitter @mainepondhockey.

For those looking to get involved with the MPHC, there are several volunteer and sponsorship opportunities available. If interested, please contact Patrick Guerette, Tournament Director, via email at mepondhockeyclassic@gmail.com.

Note: Each year we partner with a number of pond hockey tournaments throughout North America in an attempt to help them grow and expand their reach. This post is part of that partnership.

We’re giving away five copies of our new book, one each to five readers. You can enter four different ways, essentially giving you four “entries” into our random drawing at the end of the week.

• Visit and like our backyard-hockey.com Facebook page.
• Visit and like the book’s Facebook page.
• Comment below with the answer to the question: Tell us who you would build a rink for (or if you already build one, tell us about the great people who use it!)
• Tweet a message to your Twitter followers!

We’re running this giveaway with Rafflecopter, and you can enter using their application below. The contest runs from today until Friday night at midnight, and books will be mailed next week. Good luck!

a Rafflecopter giveaway


]]> http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/11/08/enter-to-win-one-of-five-signed-copies-of-backyard-ice-rink-a-step-by-step-guide/feed/ 3 http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/11/02/backyard-ice-rink-officially-published/ http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/11/02/backyard-ice-rink-officially-published/#comments Mon, 02 Nov 2015 17:55:59 +0000 http://www.backyard-hockey.com/?p=1996 615 days.

Dozens of proposal revisions.

One contract offer.

14 months to write, and rewrite, and provide pictures, and to beg all of you for even more pictures. And then beg again.

And now, on November 2 2015, one finished book. Officially published as of today.

It started with an email that quite literally fell in my lap, on Feb 24th 2014. A small MA-based publisher, whose business model is coming up with topics and then finding authors, emailed me and asked if I was interested in writing a backyard rink book. I immediately replied indicating that I was (and that may be a lie – I may have danced around my office first).

What followed was a fun, exciting, exhausting, rewarding, frustrating, and wholly life-changing experience of brain-dumping all I knew about building rinks. I hardly felt (or feel) like an authority on the topic given so many of my friends and online contacts in the niche know more than I do, so I felt a responsibility to adequately represent our community and ensure that my instruction was on point and useful.

I leaned heavily on friends like Brian Falla, who wrote the foreword (by far the best writing in the entire book), and many other friends have helped with the promotion of the book.

I begged and begged again for photos from all of you, who responded in a huge way. I wish I could have included every photo that you all submitted, and hope that at least one photo from each of you was included (alas, things like spacing requirements and resolution played a role).

Even this website has been a victim to this project, something I will absolutely remedy this upcoming season.

And now, 615 days after that first email, there’s a real, live book on the shelves. I’m told by the publisher that the initial print run is 10,000 copies split between the US and Canada. My sincerest hope is that all the knowledge you and the rink community have provided me over the years, which I hopefully have consolidated accurately…that all the encouragement and feedback you’ve given…that all the support from my friends and family…and that all of the photos you all submitted, turns those 10,000 copies into 10,000 new backyard rink families. That was the reason I wanted to write a book, and that’s the legacy I hope this book leaves behind.

About five years ago, while trying to grow the blog, I wrote the About Us page. At the time, I said that “Our primary mission is to grow the game of hockey by speaking freely of our passion, our experiences, and our love for the game.”

This book is simply an extension of that. Thank you all who have played a role in this site, the book, and our community. This book is not the capstone of this site – it is simply a new avenue to spread our love of outdoor hockey and the joys of the backyard rink. Please share the book with your network and help us turn those 10,000 copies into 10,000 new rinks.

————–

Many people have asked me how they can help promote the book. First, I appreciate you asking! I have a few ideas:

-The #1 thing you can do is purchase the book and leave a review. Whether you buy on Barnes&Noble, Amazon, or IndieBound (which also lists local indie book shops that have a copy), please leave behind your honest review. If you’re a Goodreads user, there is a page for our book there as well. Anything you can do to help influence potential book readers (which are, in turn, potential rink families), would be appreciated.

-You can also share with your networks. Facebook, Twitter, email…if you know hockey people, please let them know that our book exists.

-Buy it and give it as a gift for the holidays!

-If you have a website, blog, or have a pipeline into any magazines or newspapers, I’d love to discuss promoting the book there. I have copies to give away and would love to work with you to get the word out.

————–

For those looking to purchase, here is some additional information.

Series: Countryman Know How
Paperback: 152 pages
Publisher: Countryman Press; 1 edition (November 2, 2015)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 1581572999
ISBN-13: 978-1581572995
Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 0.5 x 8 inches

—————

Finally, we will ABSOLUTELY be giving some copies away shortly. I will post again here when we have the details ironed out.

]]> http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/11/02/backyard-ice-rink-officially-published/feed/ 4 http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/08/05/sneak-peek-of-our-upcoming-book-oh-and-we-still-need-your-rink-photos/ http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/08/05/sneak-peek-of-our-upcoming-book-oh-and-we-still-need-your-rink-photos/#respond Thu, 06 Aug 2015 01:07:44 +0000 http://www.backyard-hockey.com/?p=1979 It’s been a quiet year or so here on the blog after we announced we were writing a backyard rink book. Hopefully that’ll pay off soon enough. Just yesterday I received the first version of the book layout in PDF form, and you can see some examples of the layout below. It’s one thing to submit a 20,000-word manuscript and upload a bunch of photos to Dropbox, and it’s another thing entirely to see someone take that and turn it into something that resembles a book.









Of course, because this is only the first draft, there’s more work to be done, and that’s where you come in. To put it very loudly…

WE NEED A TON MORE PHOTOS, AND WE NEED THEM YESTERDAY BY FRIDAY, AUGUST 7TH!

Many of you will be excited to see your photos make the cut, but there were a large number of photos that couldn’t be used because (a) the resolution wasn’t high enough or (b) the images weren’t good enough to be printed in a book. Now we’re not looking for Ansel Adams here, but these need to be quality photos suitable for print. In other words, if they’re from your cell phone camera, they’ll likely be rejected. A filesize of greater than 1mb is a minimum.

What kind of photos? Glad you asked. Here’s what we’re looking for:

Rink Maintenance photos
Rink Disassembly photos
Rink Building photos
Any photos of kids/adults playing on the rink

We won’t be able to print every photo we get, but if you’d like to try getting your rink into our book, here’s what you have to do:

1 – Compose an email to joe@backyard-hockey.com.

2 – Put the hashtag #rinkbookparttwo in the subject line.

3 – Paste the following into the body of your email, and fill it out with your information:

Full Name:
Location (City, State, Country):

4 – Add in the following phrase at the bottom of your email:

“I give permission for Joe Proulx, Backyard-Hockey.com, and Countryman Press to use the attached photos in an upcoming backyard rink book. I am the sole owner of the attached photos, and I understand that I am due no compensation for the use of the attached photos.” (Sorry, I hate the legal stuff too).

I really hope this book becomes not only a resource for new rinkbuilders, but a celebration of our community, the hard work you’ve put into your rink, and the memories you’ve made on them. Stay tuned for more book info as we get closer to the early November launch!

]]> http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/08/05/sneak-peek-of-our-upcoming-book-oh-and-we-still-need-your-rink-photos/feed/ 0 http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/03/22/get-your-rink-pictures-into-our-book/ http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/03/22/get-your-rink-pictures-into-our-book/#respond Mon, 23 Mar 2015 02:37:11 +0000 http://www.backyard-hockey.com/?p=1955

Finishing the build on my first-ever rink – November 2008.

Remember when we told you last fall that we were writing a backyard rink book? Well, the manuscript is due in the next couple of weeks, and now we need to start thinking about the layout and visuals. That means we need your rink pictures!

For the most part, we’re looking for photos of your completed rink so that we can show readers (ie, prospective rinkbuilders) all the different flavors of backyard rink. There are plywood rinks, Nicerinks, framed-board rinks, full-board rinks, and everything in between…and we want to be able to inspire folks who pick up our book and drive home what we’ve always said — that there are as many ways to build a rink as there are rink builders.

We won’t be able to print every photo we get, but if you’d like to try getting your rink into our book, here’s what you have to do:

1 – Compose an email to joe@backyard-hockey.com.

2 – Put the hashtag #rinkbook in the subject line.

3 – Paste the following into the body of your email, and fill it out with your information:

Full Name:
Location (City, State, Country):
Rink Dimensions:
Materials Used (ie, ‘Plywood with wooden stakes’, ‘OSB with rebar’, ‘Full Nicerink’):

4 – Add in the following phrase at the bottom of your email:

“I give permission for Joe Proulx, Backyard-Hockey.com, and Countryman Press to use the attached photos in an upcoming backyard rink book. I am the sole owner of the attached photos, and I understand that I am due no compensation for the use of the attached photos.” (Sorry, I hate the legal stuff too).

5 – Attach no more than THREE photos to your email. What we’re really looking for are photos that show how the rinks are built…but if you have a cool picture of your kid, or a skating party you hosted, or something else you think we might like, feel free to include it.

The deadline to send in your photos is Tuesday, March 31st, so you have just over a week to pick your three photos and send ’em in. Who knows…maybe you’ll end up being featured in our book! Good luck!

]]> http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/03/22/get-your-rink-pictures-into-our-book/feed/ 0 http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/02/19/the-coolest-hockey-bedroom-ever-the-diy-hockey-helmet-lamp/ http://www.backyard-hockey.com/2015/02/19/the-coolest-hockey-bedroom-ever-the-diy-hockey-helmet-lamp/#respond Thu, 19 Feb 2015 19:03:56 +0000 http://www.backyard-hockey.com/?p=1923 The Coolest Hockey Bedroom EVER is a series of posts chronicling the transformation from a boring bedroom to a hockey heaven for my son. You can read about his dresser here, his locker here, his headboard here, his hockey stick hooks here, and his broken stick corner shelf here. Have an idea for the room? Comment below.

Hockey lamps are a little hard to come by. If you’re lucky you can find one online (like this generic one, or this one, or this interesting contraption), but they’re expensive and there’s not a lot to choose from. So in true cheapskate fashion, when it came time to add some more lighting to my son’s hockey-themed room, I built one myself for under $12.





Like many of my how-to posts, there is no single way to do this. The info below is how I did it, but feel free to let your own creativity run wild and tweak this DIY to suit your skillset, your available parts, and your imagination.

Also, before we begin, a quick warning. This DIY will deal a bit with electricity and may involve things like splicing wires, fiddling with light sockets, or replacing plugs. If you’re not comfortable with that, please don’t attempt this project. Also, we’re talking about building a lamp out of a plastic helmet. Make sure the bulbs you use don’t generate too much heat (so use compact fluorescent or LEDs), and always test the lamp for several hours before putting it in your kid’s room.

Step 1 – Assemble the parts

Before you begin, think about how you’ll want to put this lamp together. Amazon (and many hobby shops) sell lamp kits, and those should work well. Because I tend to wake up in the morning and say “I’m going to build a helmet lamp today”, I didn’t have the luxury of online ordering, so I grabbed an inexpensive lamp from my local department store.



Here’s the cheapo lamp I purchased for $5.

As for the helmet, I have quite a collection that we use when people come skate on our rink. That said, a handful of them are very old and not entirely safe to use, so I grabbed one of these for my project. Skate sales or craigslist is a good place to try if you don’t currently have an old helmet. Note that you will destroy this helmet as part of this project, and it will not be usable for protecting one’s melon when you’re done.

As for tools, you’ll want some electrical tools like a wire cutter and wire stripper, some electrical tape, a screwdriver of some sort and then a drill with drill bits.



Some of the tools you’ll need.

Step 2 – Prepare the lamp components

If you purchased a lamp kit, this step likely involves opening a box and laying the components on your work surface. Lamp kits typically include the light socket, some wiring, a way to attach a shade, and some other components.

But for me, this step involved disassembling the cheap table lamp I purchased. These inexpensive lamps are typically assembled not unlike a child would put together a macaroni necklace, with the cord being strung through the middle of each component. My lamp had a single nut under the base, and when that nut was unthreaded, all the components came apart.



Here’s the nut that holds the entire lamp together. I removed mine with needle-nose pliers. And yes, apparently WalMart uses some sort of concrete as the base in their lamps. Who knew?

The challenge in using the ‘deconstruct an existing lamp’ approach is that your power cord is terminated on both ends – one end has the plug and the other end has the light socket. To take apart a lamp like this, you need to make a decision as to how you’ll want to put everything back together.



This shows the lamp when the nut was removed, but you can see how you can’t remove all the components due to the socket on one end and the plug on the other.

You essentially have three options:

1 – If your lamp socket (the part where you screw in the bulb) allows you to remove the wiring with screws, then you can unscrew the wiring and pull the wiring through the components. Most cheap lamps (like the one I bought) have soldered wire connections and so this wasn’t an option for me.

2 – If you want a cleaner finished look, you can cut the wire closest to the plug and when you’re re-assembling the lamp, you can use one of these replacement plugs, like this one. Just make sure (a) that it is the correct size and type for your lamp and (b) that you follow the manufacturer’s instructions when installing it.

3 – If you’re like me (entirely unprepared for the job and just trying to get it done before the kids get home from school), you can simply cut the wires somewhere in the middle and then re-attach them with a wire stripper and electrical tape as shown in this Youtube video. The first two options are preferable, but this one works too, and it’s what I did for my lamp.

One you’ve decided on an approach and have all of your lamp components laid out, move on to the next step.



Here’s my lamp after I cut the power cord (visible in the top left) and got everything disconnected.

Step 3 – Destroying the helmet

Before I got to drilling holes in the helmet, I went through and pulled off any parts that (a) looked ugly or (b) I could use elsewhere. Things like chin straps, j-channels, ear pieces, cages, and screws don’t really add to the aesthetics of your lamp and can be used in your helmet repair kit (because you have one of those in your kid’s bag, right?). I also gave the helmet a quick wipe with a wet cloth and some Goo-Gone to get rid of some old sticker residue.



These are the parts I removed from the helmet. Some I kept, some I tossed.



My helmet, mostly disassembled and cleaned.

To complete this step, it was as simple as taking a knife and cutting out a section of padding on the inside of the helmet, and then drilling a hole in the top that would accept the lamp rod.



Here’s the inside of the helmet before I cut away the padding.



And here’s the helmet with the center piece of the padding cut away.



Line up your drill bit (make sure it’s large enough so it’ll accept the lamp rod/components) and go to town.

Step 4 – The Re-assembly

This is where you get to re-assemble your ‘macaroni necklace’ by putting your lamp components back onto the cord.



With the lamp reassembled through the hole in the helmet, you can see the original lamp components from the inside of the helmet.

When I was putting mine back together, I did this step a few times to eventually get the look I was going for. Because the lamp I started with was so small (see ‘things I’d do differently’ below), if I put too many pieces of my lamp on the top of the helmet, then the base couldn’t reach the table to hold the lamp up (and I wanted the lamp base to be on the table versus having the helmet, which isn’t all that stable, to serve as the base).

So the way my helmet lamp ended up was that just the light socket and a couple washers are on the top of the helmet, while the rest of my original lamp (and the base piece) are inside the helmet. This way the helmet sits on the actual lamp base and is very stable.



You can see what I mean about using the lamp base to hold the entire unit upright.

And here’s my end result! I am planning on grabbing a couple helmet stickers from my son’s travel team to complete the custom look, and the lamp will live on his homework desk.







What I’d do differently

Like any rushed DIY project, I had some “Aw, man!” moments when I was done. Learn from me.

1 – I wish I’d gotten a taller lamp. With the shade attached, the entire lamp looks too compressed and the helmet doesn’t really pop. Plus there was the aforementioned issue with the base not reaching the table when I first put it back together. A taller lamp, perhaps with more components, would give you more reassembly options.

2 – I wish I’d purchased a lamp that either had screw connections where the wire meets the socket, or had the foresight to purchase a replaceable plug. As it was, I rushed myself and now my cord has a bunch of electrical tape holding it together.

3 – I wish I’d gotten some cool helmet stickers before taking the photos so you could envision how awesome a gift this could be for a little hockey player. My lamp is pretty generic in the photos, but it really pops when you add your kids’ favorite team stickers to it.

Have any questions? Did you build one yourself? Share it in the comments and please share this post to Facebook and Pinterest!

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