Curtains, curtains!!

I've been on a curtain...rampage, or something, the last few days at my house. It started with my bedroom, which I'm in the middle of redoing, and it has spread to other areas of the house. I wanted black and white curtains for my bedroom, and unfortunately, I could not find any that I liked. Actually, I found one that was okay but it was $80 per curtain, and I need 3 of them. So instead I decided to make my own, and even though I think I spent, or will have to spend about $100 on supplies it's still cheaper and I'll get exactly what I want rather than "I suppose that would work."

I read a few blogs about doing this and they all said it's a ton of work and you better make sure you're cut out for it before you take on a project like this. They were right. :) I don't think anyone should take on this project unless they have lots of patience for tedious work and really, really care about their dang curtains.

I bought some cheap(ish) curtains at IKEA and had to whiten them a little bit because I realized when I got home that they were a bit yellow-y. So I used white-wash and a little bleach (not mixed together...) and that worked alright. I hemmed them, and then I painted a stencil pattern on. I got the stencil at Hobby Lobby for about $8, and it worked pretty well, but oh my goodness it was so much work. And no matter how careful I was, I got little leaks and drips and things, so it's not exactly perfect...especially the edges! And don't even ask me about doing around the grommets. :) The first section I did over the grommets was okay, then I moved the stencil over to do the next section and DOH! Don't do that! Wash it completely off first!!!! I read online that people didn't wash the stencil off between sections, just kept going and it was fine, but I think they're crazy or I fail, because that was a terrible idea. I could do a maximum of two sections without washing but only if there were no edges, no seams, no grommets, etc. And I STILL got lots of little leaks. I tried spray glue but it only lasted for one section and it left a nasty residue on my stencil. If there was maybe a washable spray glue that would work, but I have never seen anything like that. And adding another step in there might kill me.

This is me putting a pan of soapy water underneath the curtain to spot clean where I got black smudges galore. It actually worked really well to get the paint out! Phew!!!

I hung this one up and I love it!!!!! You will have to wait until the room is finished to see it... :)

I also decided to *finally* change the dining room curtains. I have despised the short little red curtains in there since we moved in, but I am the absolute worst at hanging curtains rods, so I was putting it off forever. I discovered that Will is actually really good at hanging curtain rods, so he's now my official curtain-rod-hanger. I refuse to ever do it again.

I just put white curtains in the dining room. I was thinking I would match the fabric on the kitchen window treatment, but when I went to Joann's to buy like 6 yards of it, they had...none. It was discontinued.

Can I just rant for a minute here please? This has been driving me NUTS lately. Will and I are on our way to being completely out of debt, so that means I have to be careful and stick to a fairly tight budget. So I give myself a little money every month to work on the house, and sometimes I do part of one project but don't finish it, in order to be responsible and finish the project the next month, or when I have the money. But it happens EVERY TIME! They discontinue what I need. Or I put off buying a sweater that I want so bad, and save up my babysitting money till I have enough and then...it's gone. :'( It seriously happens to me ALL. THE. TIME. In fact just last night I went to Costco to buy a dress for Kaylee I've been eyeing for a while and waiting until I had the money for it, and - you guessed - gone. Not just her size, but every single dress they had. So, so, frustrating. But I refuse to give in to consumerism and buy whatever I want when I want it. I REFUSE!

Anyway, moving on.

So the curtains are white for the dining room but the grommets were bright silver and my rod is black. I literally lay awake thinking about this one night, and I decided to...paint the grommets. Yep. Call me insane. It actually worked really well and was very easy! The only downer is the curtains are no longer washable, which could be a problem since, well, they're in the dining room, and Ben likes to splash things like chocolate milk and spaghetti sauce. We'll see if spot cleaning will work or if I'll have to come up with something else.

Sorry the pictures are not the greatest, I took them in a hurry with children tripping me the entire time. I'm loving it so far, I want a new chandelier but I'm happy with the progress. It lightens up the room to have the white curtains and doesn't the window look way bigger now? It's amazing what a difference you can make with where you hang the curtains.

Now I'm trying to decide what curtains I want in the living room, but I am really struggling with those. I want to change them soon because they're about 7 inches too short and look ridiculous, but I simply cannot decide what to put in there. It doesn't help that I'm planning on getting rid of all of the furniture and starting over, so I don't even know the colors that will be in there. I'm considering making more stenciled curtains because I am so in love with how my bedroom one looks, but I honestly don't know if I have the energy to do that. Hmmm.....decisions...