Becoming Vera Wang: Curtains

Now that I have a sewing machine, I decided that I needed space to sew.  The night I used my machine for the first time, I simply set things up in the breakfast nook.  However, that won't work long term and I quickly designated the solarium as my new sewing spot.

Unfortunately, Maya's about to lose her guard post

My first order of business was to hang some curtains.  The sunroom/solarium (is there a difference anyway?) faces the front of the house and I needed some privacy.  I thought this would be a quick and easy project because I had the most important element already on hand.

I bought these curtains at IKEA when I lived in LA eight years ago!  I had visions of stringing them across an entire wall in my bedroom to frame my bed or to make my windows seem larger.

Like this

Or this

Sadly, I never got around to it in my apartment in LA, so I packed them up and they came with me to Dallas.  Working full time while juggling a full school schedule tends to put all decorating projects on the back burner, so for four years they sat in a box in my closet while I got my degree.  They then moved with me to Drew's apartment, then to our house here where they came to rest in the original box in the garage.  When I finally started this project, I ran out to the garage and clapped my hands like a little girl that I remembered where they were and that they were in perfect condition!  

I bought eight packages so I had 16 panels to work with.  I knew I wouldn't need that many (ended up with five on each side) so I got busy.  A tension rod was no good because the window is super wide so any rod would have to be custom.  I wanted to do this as inexpensively as possible, and the space to hang the curtains was really narrow thanks to a decorative cornice that ended up making me want to take my own life.

I decided on picture-hanging wire with screw eyes because the curtains were so sheer they wouldn't be that heavy, although you can get picture wire that'll hold up to 150 pounds!

When you go to Lowe's, look for damaged packages.

Remember my window film?

You can get 10% off perfectly good stuff if the package is opened!

Even though the wire was less than three dollars, I still like a deal.

The screw eyes were less than a dollar.

I got up on my ladder, smug with my ingenuity.  The curtains were the first step - Vera Wang here I come!  I screwed in the first eye in thirty seconds.  The second went in with equal ease - one more to go and this would be the easiest project I've done to date!  I was going to be sewing in no time!  Me and my big fat mouth.

The third screw eye wouldn't go in despite all my pleading, cursing, sweating, cajoling, yelling, stomping, and cursing some more.  It was all the same piece of wood - I didn't get it! Was this wood-painted stone? In this one spot?  This damn curtain was standing in the way of me becoming Vera Wang!  Luckily, Drew got home the next day and I knew his muscles would be able to do the trick.  After much cursing, sweating, yelling, cursing, getting off the ladder to get a different screw, cursing some more and brute force, he got the third hook screwed in.

We ended up using these from this project.  

I don't mind that they don't match, you can't see them anyway.

I wrapped the wire around the first eye and then strung five curtain panels on the wire.  Then I threaded it through the center eye and strung five more panels before wrapping the wire around the hook on the other end.

The cornice hides all the screws and even though the curtains are light,

they still make the wire dip down.

Anyone who wants to comment on that fact must first 

promise to come to my house and fix it.

Otherwise, zip it.

Next on the list was to shorten the curtains.  They were 108 inches long which isn't a problem when you're hanging them from the ceiling but they were too bunchy for these windows.

Bunchiness is a technical term, in case you were wondering.

So I got really technical and fixed the problem.  Meaning, I grabbed my scissors, eyeballed the length and chopped.  Repeat for all remaining panels and hope they're even.  This process should be patented.  Anyone who uses it owes me a $5,000 royalty.  

My lovely assistant documenting my process from the living room.

Is it even?  Ish?

Guess what, anyone who wants to get on this floor and critique

should get a life.

Taking a little more off the bottom.

You can see at the bottom right it's much less bunchy.

I think this is before I cut the length but this is pretty much the finished product.

Only once I'd done all that did I realize my mistake.  You see, my ridiculous dog can open doors and she loves the sunroom.  We have to lock the door to keep her out of there because she barks at anything walking by, especially dogs, and the occasional stray cat will make her bananas.  She has a big bark anyway and with the echo in that room she sounds like a monster, which is super annoying at six in the morning on a Saturday.  We've taken to putting a chair in front of the door to keep her in our bedroom so she won't go out there and bark at the newspaper in the driveway.

Well, one day she got particularly excited at something passing by and got her paw stuck in one of the panels and ripped a big hole in it.  Of course, it's in the middle of the wire so I'm going to have to cut that panel down, unwrap the wire, thread another panel on it, attempt to pull it tighter so it won't droop and re-wrap the wire.  This is a giant pain in the ass and I didn't think of that when I hung one continuous wire across the window.  I'm not looking forward to it.

But I have curtains!  The house looks so much nicer from the outside with them but more importantly, I'm one step closer to becoming Vera Wang using my sewing machine for the second time ever!

Wait till I show you my table!