If you’re anything like me, curtains seem to be the last thing I think about in a room. I know they finish the look off, but I just have a hard time finding what I really want! So today’s guest, Kathleen from Fearlessly Creative Mammas, must have known that I needed a little kick in the pants to get thinking about window treatments with these Easy DIY Curtains. I met Kathleen at an Idaho bloggers function in December, and she’s amazingly sweet. It’s been fun to get to know her a little better since then. And, as a fun side note, I totally have some of this same black damask fabric in my stash…too funny. Take it away Kathleen!
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Hello! I’m Kathleen, half of the duo from Fearlessly Creative Mammas and I’m happy to be here today. Thanks so much to Lisa for having me over to show you the curtains I made for my teenage niece’s bedroom. Also, congratulations on that beautiful baby girl. So exciting!
Since I’ve never been here before, I thought I would tell you a little about our blog. I blog with my oldest daughter about recipes, crafts, diy and family. It seems a little broad, I know, but we didn’t want to just do one thing, so we didn’t. We’ve been blogging for about 18 months.
Back in March I went to Florida to visit my mom and sister. My sister had this awesome idea to re-do her 13 year old daughter’s bedroom. Of course, she roped me in because that’s kind of how we do things. We painted Sky’s room while I was there and then my sister picked out this great fabric for me to make some curtains. I brought the fabric home because I didn’t have a sewing machine there.
So the thing here is that they decided to buy another house and move about a month after I left, so those curtains were never hung in Sky’s room. My sister hung them on her bedroom window for the pictures, so they don’t have the pretty blue paint behind them. Bummer. That’s okay though. You can still see what they look like. Personally, right about now I’m happy I don’t live in Florida. They are painting both their old and new house. Sounds like a lot of work. Now, on to the curtains.
I have to say first of all that I kind of sewed these by the seat of my pants. I kept adding things that weren’t in the original plan. I think it made them better. The first step is to cut the fabric to the correct length. I wanted them to hang below the window, so I added 4 inches to the length, plus 2 inches for folding over the edges. For the width, I measured twice the width of fabric, so there was some gathering when they were hung.
Next, I ironed the fabric and the folded each side over twice with each fold being 1/2 an inch. The reason I folded them twice is because I wanted the edges to look nice and finished, but I don’t have a Serger.
I decided I wanted to add some pink to the curtains to pull the small amount of pink in the fabric out. It’s also my niece’s favorite color, just like me. For each tab, I measured the fabric 4 inches by 7 inches. I wanted 4 tabs on each curtain, so I cut 8.
Then I folded the fabric in half and sewed around two sides. After I sewed the sides, I cut the excess off of the seam and rounded the corners.
Next, I turned the tabs right side out and ironed them to flatten the edges. I also folded the non-sewn edge under and sewed it closed. Then I sewed the tabs to the inside of the curtains, evenly spacing them with two on the edges of the curtains.
I decided to add a little ruffle on the bottom of the curtain, so I ran to the fabric store and bought this black ruffle and sewed it on the bottom. I’m so glad I did because she really likes the ruffle.
This is the bottom of the curtain, so you can see the ruffle. I think it adds something nice to it and mades it a little fancy for a teenage girl. What do you think?
Finally, as a serious afterthought, I got these big black buttons and sewed them on the curtains at the tabs. Again, to make them more teenager like.
And here is the final product. What do you think? Do you have a teenage daughter that might like some curtains like these? They only took me about 2 hours to make. An awesome project to make my sweet niece a happy girl. I love that!
Thanks so much again to Lisa for introducing me to you all today. I hope you like the project. I also hope you will stop over to Fearlessly Creative Mammas and see what we are cooking up. You can get all of our social media links on the blog too. If you’re a blogger, we have a link party starting on Monday nights at 10:00 pm Eastern Time we’d love for you to join as well.
I'd love to hear your thoughts–leave me a comment!