The Curtain Project

My daughter's new home has two sets of double windows in the front of the house:  one set in the dining area, and one set in the studio area...all on the same wall.  Since the color scheme in both areas is black and white, Meg was looking for curtains that would work.  IKEA to the rescue!

Meg found some cheap curtain panels at IKEA that are somewhat sheer white with printed black trees and Seuss-esque birds.  She bought four panels for each window set--eight panels in all.  They looked cute.  They were way too long and would need to be hemmed, plus they were too sheer.  I knew I could hem them, but in short order, she decided that they needed to be lined.  Well!  That do add another wrinkle!

I dragged my feet on the project for at least a week while I "ciphered" on how to proceed.  If I bought lining material, how much would it take?  Would it launder (shrink) at the same rate as the curtains?  How would I attached the lining to the curtains without having the take the curtains totally apart and not have the lining drag down the tabs at the top?  If I did all the work, would the end result be satisfactory?  I worried on it for a looong time.  Then, on Meg's next trip to IKEA, she came home with four panels of heavy white tabbed curtains to use as lining.  We strung both sets of curtains on the same rod and discovered that maybe I didn't have to line the originals.  Maybe we could just hem them all and string them on the same rod.  It seemed to work....but she hadn't bought enough.  Thus, the NEXT trip to IKEA netted four more panels.  (Are you following me, so far??)

Both the printed curtains and the white curtains said "do not tumble dry"...yet both were able to be ironed.  The printed ones needed a cool iron.  The white ones needed a hot iron.  I had Meg bring home another set of the printed curtains for experimenting.  We washed and tumble dried them all before I ever started the hemming project.  The printed curtains came out fine.  The white curtain shrank about four inches in length.  (Good to know!)

I started the hemming process.  We were now looking at four panels of printed curtains per window (8) and four panels of white curtains per window (also 8), which makes a total of 16 curtains that needed to be hemmed.  I measured from the bottom.  Several days later, they were done and ready to be hung.  (Slowed down by the fact that I can't stand for long.)  When the first eight were hung, strung on the same rod, Meg decided that she didn't like it.  Needed a double rod.  (Not my problem.)  I continued with the hemming project almost up to the day I left...and doggone it...one panel wasn't short enough!!!  I did them all the same, assembly line style...but failed on that one panel.  Next time I'm up there, I'll fix it.  I hate it when stuff doesn't work like it should!

Just so you'll all feel sorry for what I was doing, I measured, pinned, cut, re-pinned, ironed up the measurements, stitched, and ironed 16 panels of curtains.  Took 12 inches off the printed curtains and 23 inches off the white ones.  The double rods were installed and the curtains looked good in spite of me.  It took days.  (Do you feel sorry for me now??)

I hope it made a difference.  Meg might not be happy with the results, in which case I will invite her to tackle the next such project herself.  She can do it.  She just was busy with other stuff!