Our Guests Have Privacy!

It's been a pretty busy couple of weeks - me starting school last week, Chad being busy with work-related stuff, and my trip to Chicago last weekend - we just haven't gotten a whole lot done on the house. This weekend (3 days!!!) should be a good opportunity for us to get moving again.

Before school started, though, I was able to finally finish the curtains for the guest bedroom. This is for the windows above the window seat we built, and they stretch almost the entire wall opposite the bed. We used hooks, wire, and turnbuckles to create a curtain "rod" that stretches the entire length of that wall of windows. It's a pretty neat set-up - I've seen it used in large open spaces to create privacy. First we screwed the hooks into the adjacent walls from the wall with the windows. We cut the wire a bit longer (enough for a loop at each end) than the length of the wall, made a loop, secured the loop with a wire rope clip, and hooked it on one of the hooks. We did the same for the other hook, but attached a turnbuckle between the loop and the hook. We then used the turnbuckle to tighten the rope so that it wouldn't droop when we hung the curtains. As much as I championed this idea, I was secretly nervous it wouldn't work, but it really did.

Mom helped me hunt for curtain material, and we found two large (60" by 120") teal tablecloths at Bed Bath & Beyond that cost $25 each. I could never buy that much fabric at JoAnns for $50, so it was a real steal. She also found inspiration for them in a Better Homes and Gardens magazine, which I loved.

With her help, the sewing took a while to get started (making your own pattern takes a lot of time), but once we/she figured out the process, it went pretty quickly. Each edge (except the bottom) was folded forward, and then brown ribbon was sewn on the seam to cover the edge of the fabric. The top and inside edges were folded wider to make space for buttons and buttonholes. The bottom was hemmed with the hemming feature on the sewing machine. I ended up with "draggy" curtains, which I'm not usually a fan of, but the ribbon caused the fabric to be uneven along the bottom. I didn't think there was any way to hem them straight across the bottom without the two sides pulling up. I'm pretty happy with how they came out. The only change I might have made is using interfacing down the inside folds - they are kind of floppy and interfacing might have helped.
Each panel looks like:The top of the panels looks like:
and