Well obviously my New Year's intention is a bust....but we'll try and hop back in the saddle.

My mother, who is an avid and gifted seamstress (she used to make my formals when I was in high school!) got a new sewing machine for Christmas this past year. Since her old (and very nice)sewing machine still works just fine, she decided to hand it down to me. Well, it sat in my guest-room-to-be for a few months, unused. I have to admit, sewing has always been pretty intimidating for me. This weekend, however, I finally worked up the nerve to try my hand at some (very) simple curtains.....as in, all I had to do was hem all four sides of the fabric haha.

I had seen this neato fabric online....

But didn't really fall in love with it until I decided to paint the guest-room-to-be (currently serving as my music room until we get the garage converted to living space) a dark, muted teal color (Martha Stewart's Plumage, for those of you who are wondering).

See how the color just begs for some more white, and maybe some dove grey, plus maybe some pattern? Don't worry....the rug is not staying in there.....

Anyways, I picked up eleven yards of the stuff for just under $8/yard at The Fabric House a couple months ago (yes...I really have been putting this off that long). This past weekend, I took a deep breath and dove in.

Bam....it's not a great picture. I'll be able to get better ones, I think, once I can move things to the new music room....or at least figure out how to shoot looking at a window without the photo getting washed out....maybe I'll try to get some pics when it's dark outside.

Breaking down the budget, the fabric cost me about $88, plus another $5 or so for thread. That works out to about $45 per window. In most stores, you would spend at least that much per panel, so I think I did pretty well!

Anyone else been making curtains lately?

Just Call Me DaVinci, Part III

Ok, I think I officially deserve a break from painting for a little while. My latest project: the master bedroom.

The bedroom was painted tan, just like the rest of the house. I discovered why the house was painted right before being put on the market. When I removed the light switch and outlet covers, this is what I discovered.

Yes, Ladies and Gentlemen, that is lime green. Almost neon. Yikes.

My goal in this room is to create a light, airy, soothing feel, so I decided to go with a lighter shade of the aqua that is in the dining room...almost white with a very slight aqua tint. I also decided to tackle this two walls at a time, mostly because it was way easier to move the stuff away from two adjacent walls (an L, if you will), take down curtains, remove outlet covers, paint, and edge and then repeat on the other side of the room. Here are things halfway done. Observe the chaos.

Actually, it was more chaotic when I moved the furniture on the other side of the room, since there was more furniture there, but that's ok. You get the idea.

After dealing with all the tape in the dining room, and not really wanting to have to tape off this whole room, I broke down and bought an edger to do the tops and bottoms of the walls as well as around doors and windows. Can I just say.....sooooo much easier than taping! This wouldn't have worked with the panels in the dining room, but made things go way faster this time around.

Anyway, here's the finished product.

 

That first picture made me realize I really need to do something to cover the box spring. It's pretty hideous. Also, I have quite a list of to-do's for this room. Not that there's really all that many to-do's, they just seem like big ones!

• Find a place to put some closet space (the original owner turned the closet in this bedroom into the stairwell to the basement after he dug it out of the crawlspace...a story for another day). These will probably be Ikea wardrobes, but we shall see.
• Get a new (queen-sized) bed.
• Move the current bed and my dresser into the guest room (which is currently my music room until we can get the garage renovated).

Have you tackled any painting projects lately? I'd love to hear about them!