Ring Up The Curtains

 

I have been very preoccupied this year with curtain making. I think my friends and work colleagues may have got a bit bored with my answer to "what have you been up to?", always being making curtains. But they are done, and I am very pleased. Although I have made curtains before, that was quite a while ago, and making 8 was quite a job. 

They definitely make the living room cosier, and also less echoy. Although we are now thinking that they may stand out better with a slightly different wall colour. But I suppose there is always something to do.

My pets always seem to want to part of a photoshoot, and although our cat Joey can be a bit naughty, he at least does not seem to be a curtain climber. 

The fabric was bought from Lenka Dresses on Etsy, and called Sole Raya Grey Stripe. I was very pleased with it, and the whole ordering process. It is extra wide, with the stripes going across the width, so I was able to make full length curtains without having to have any seams.

I have always used pencils pleats before, but this time went for pinch pleats, which I think has worked quite well. 

And although I am planning to get back to the knitting, we still have a bedroom without curtains, so I have been browsing at fabric again.

Reupholstered Bed Headboard

We are doing some DIY, and decided that part of redecorating my son's room meant recovering the headboard of his bed. I've not really done anything like this before, but as I used to be a teaching assistant, have had plenty of experience with a staple gun. We took off the covered buttons which matched the old headboard, but decided to pick a fabric that would contrast. We bought the fabric at Sooz Custon Clothing in Okehampton, which is the best fabric shop I have come across locally. There was an enormous selection of furnishing, dressmaking fabrics, and haberdashery, as well as some great advice about the process of covering the board. I will definitely be calling in there again.

We went for a fabric to match the look of the bedframe, which is a bit industrial looking. I've still got to fasten the frame in place, which will be a little lower and fit under the lower bar, but I think you can see that the end result looks great. To get the buttons in place I used a very long and large needle (which I found in my sewing box), which went through the holes already there in the board.

 

Seaside Chair

This rather disgraceful looking chair was bought from IKEA about 16 years ago. At first it was the chair that I had in my son's room next to his cot, so I had somewhere comfy to sit and feed him during the night. It has moved around the house, and more recently has become the chair my soon-to-be 95 year old mother likes to sit in when she visits us. It is fairly small, which suits her, and can be moved up really close to the TV. But as you can see it has become very tatty.
 
The covers are removable, so I decided it was time to give it a make over. The first job was to take apart the old covers. This unpicking took me a lot of work, but I thought it was the best way to make sure I had accurate pattern pieces.

The second job, which took me almost as long, was to pick a fabric. After a lot of trips to fabric shops, I decided that the best way to make the job least stressful was to pick something relatively inexpensive. There is nothing worse than having an expensive fabric to cut into, when you are not completely confident that the project is going to work. I also knew that some sections had to be gathered, so didn't want anything too thick. I also wanted something washable, as being realistic we do have quite a few spills.

Work in progress ...

I loved this rather unique seaside fabric. It doesn't really go with the living room, so the chair may live in a bedroom, and just be brought down when Granny comes to visit.

The sewing was much easier than I imagined. A professional upholsterer may have done a better job, but I think it has given the chair a new lease of life. For the seat cushion I used some heavy weight denim that I already had, as I thought it needed something a bit more hardwearing, and the seaside fabric might be a bit much over the whole chair.

Well someone is very happy and is already making herself at home on the new seaside chair!