done & done

I finally finished the curtains for our bedroom. The fabric had been sitting in our bedroom, still on the bolt, for about 3 months. I made two panels and a fixed roman shade. I bought 7.5 yards of fabric from JoAnne's and the curtain rod and clip rings from Walmart. {sorry in advance for the dark b.berry pics}

I wanted the panels to be 89" so I cut the fabric at about 96", allowing for a top and bottom hem. Ya'll, this really wasn't as easy as I thought it was going to be. Figuring out how to make the hems level and how to make sure that the entire panel stayed at 89" was tough! So, a little secret...I made about a 2" hem at the top of each panel and then went ahead and hung them up. (truth be told, I only did this on the second panel bc I tried doing the first one the hard way and only then did I come up with this genius idea) Once they were up I pinned the bottoms so they would just touch the floor. I then brought my handy portable sewing machine into the bedroom and sewed the bottom hem while the panels were up! I realize this is probably not the most professional method, but it worked! As for the side hems, (obviously I did these before handing them up) I left the fabric the width of the bolt and folded it under once, then one more time and sewed a straight stitch down the length. Ironing the folds really makes this step easier.

The day after I got these done I found this tutorial over at Young House Love. If you don't sew, or just want to use an easier method, I suggest you check out their post!

I made the fixed roman shade following Darby's tutorial, which you can find here. Mine is a little wonky and of course not as great as hers, but I like it ok.

see how it kind of goes up on the right? oh well!