Shifting Gears

Got back from my daughter's a couple of days ago.  Now it's time to prepare my OWN home for company!  I will have my former son-in-law, his wife, her mother, and her daughter here for Race Weekend.  Nathan's parents live just a mile from here, but their extra bedrooms aren't available, so the race-goers stay with me.  I'll have to enlist help for some things, but if I start now, I should be able to get it all done in a week, ya think??

At least I won't be making curtains.  When I was at Meg's, she wanted curtain valances for her bedroom windows.  In order to match her Calvin Klein comforter, she bought a king sized sheet from the set, hoping there would be enough fabric for two valances and two pillow shams.  We didn't know how much fabric we had, but we went in search of a pattern.  Found one at the local JoAnn Fabrics that she liked--on sale for $1-- brought it home, and we started ciphering on how to cut, etc.  Well!  What wasn't mentioned on the outside of the pattern envelope was the fact that the pattern called for 325 inches of bias binding that would have to be made from the fabric, times two (because we were making two valances).  Do the math.  That's 650 inches of bias binding that I didn't think we'd have fabric for and really didn't want to make!  We went to a bigger JoAnn's in Vernon Hills, hoping to find bias tape that we could substitute and/or find some cheap fabric that would suffice, but there was none to be found.  (It's a really tough color to match.)  Back to Square One.

Several days passed.  We figured we needed to go back to the local JoAnn's to find a different pattern--which we did, only this time, they were no longer on sale.  :(  With careful cutting, we found that there would be enough fabric for both valances and shams.  I sewed the curtains and the shams, and we got them installed.  Looking good!  Then Megan, always the perfectionist, decided that the little 24-inch-square window off to the side would bother her sensitivities if it didn't have a valance, too.  I found just enough scrap to make a smaller version of the valance and purchased a rod that would work.  Voila!  But then, Meg decided that she wanted a throw pillow to match.  She had some scraps left over from cutting the shams and had a pillow form in storage, so she made a patchwork throw pillow to match--all from that one king sized sheet!  I give us an A for creativity and use of materials, but only a C for speed.  Still, I have to say that the finished products look really good--better than expected, actually--and put a nice finishing touch on the bedroom. 

So now, I need to refocus my energies on my own bedrooms for the company that will be here next weekend.  Wish me luck!