Bathroom Window Treatment

I searched premade window treatments for my little window in my guest bath but I either didn't like what I found or didn't want to fork over the money for it.  Story of my life.

I decided I was better off just making my own.  I searched fabric stores online but nothing really jumped out at me.  I liked how the ugly old shade let in light so I didn't want anything too heavy yet I didn't want just plain white.  I decided to just roam Target in search of fabric I liked.  I checked out their drapes, table clothes, sheets and shower curtains.  Random, yes.  But a cheap way to find fabric.  I found a keeper in the shower curtain aisle!

It is white with just a simple border pattern around the bottom.  My goal is to eventually sew this into a roman shade with the border along the bottom of the shade.  But until I get around for that, I figured I would just wrap it around my existing shade since the curtain was basically twice the width of my shade.

Biscuit was helpful as always with this process.  What's it with dogs and the need to sit on things?  I rolled the shade back up and stuck it on my window.

Not bad for a temporary fix.  Once I actually sew the roman shade, there will be less white at the bottom so the border will be lower.  And since I was at Target buying stuff (my new alarm clocks included) I picked up a couple more things for the bathroom including this awesome plant that I can not kill because it's plastic!

And I got a new print to hang above the towel rack.  It is a little bigger than the one I had hanging there before.

Hopefully I will finish painting all the trim tonight and be able to clean the bathroom back up.  It should be good to go until I get around to sewing my roman shade.  Note to self:  Google 'How to Make a Roman Shade' soon.

Needlepoint Saves Me $158.00

I have already discussed my obsession with Jonathan Adler.  I just love everything he does.  Unfortunately I can't afford 90% of what he does, but such is life.  [sidenote: Barnes & Noble has a line of JA designs especially for their stores and the prices are awesome!  Haven't picked anything up yet, but might after Christmas.]  Anyway...another thing I love in life is the movie Mommie Dearest.  This is in no way to be a reflection on my own childhood.  I just love me some demented Joan Crawford by way of Faye Dunaway.  So I was super excited to see this new pillow in Jonathan Adler's Needlepoint collection.

I love everything about this pillow.  Everything except the price.  $165.00.  No, even I know that's too much for a 9" throw pillow.  That's when I got the brilliant idea to learn to needlepoint and make my own.  I started out in early November after purchasing about $7.00 in supplies (yarn and the grid).

I just sort of freehanded it from what stiches I could see in the photo of the pillow.

I ran out of room for the third hanger but still think I did a pretty good job!  It took about 5 weeks (which may be why the hand stitched pillow is so costly) and I finally finished it last night.

I was going to turn it in to a pillow but now I think I'm going to frame it and hang it in my soon-to-be-redone master closet.  That renovation won't get started until after the new year but in the meantime I'll be starting my next needlepoint project.  This next one will become a pillow eventually.  So, sorry about stealing the JA design but I think of it as a nod of appreciation.  And once I win that lottery, I promise to hit the Jonathan Adler store for a shopping spree.

Stitched Placecards

Something about the cooler weather always makes me want to do needle crafts.  So strange, I know.  Every winter I pick up the crochet needle or start knitting.  I'm currently working on a needlepoint but when I ran across these patterns on Martha Stewart's website, I picked up my cross stitching supplies.

I didn't really have a plan when I started.  I just started mixing and matching the heads and bodies to create my family, or at least the ones I would be hosting for Thanksgiving.  My winter needle craft habit is evident by the fact that I had all these supplies in my possession. 

At first I thought I might put these in frames but then I wanted to add a take home treat element to the placecard.  Mason Jars!  Aren't they always the answer? 

I filled then with colorful M&M's...a family favorite, added a little stuffing behind each cross stitch and then created my lid.

A little corny, they added a fun little element to the table.  Hopefully I offended no family members with my rudimentary renderings. 

Not a bad little project and it only set me back about $10 for jars and M&M's....both of which I got to keep the leftovers.  Score!

The Chair is Finished!

My extra fabric showed up on my doorstep yesterday and I was able to tackle the rest of my chair.  This gave me something to do last night since nothing was on TV except election coverage.  I had already made my felt patterns of the 3 pieces I was lacking so all I needed was to cut the new fabric and start putting it all together.  The cushion was a little challenging but I'm happy to report I now know how to install zippers!

I slapped it all together and man, was I excited with the result.  It's not perfect by any means, but it looks great.

Next came the challenge of getting it back into the office, removing the legs and squeezing it through doorways. 

 So for less than the price of a slip cover, and much less than the price of a new chair, I've given this giant chair a whole new life.  Or at least a couple more years until I get irritated with it's massive size again. 

 

Unfortunately the rest of the office is a mess right now so I can't show you a full room shot at the moment.  I'm cleaning out closets and files and generating various piles of junk.  The Presidential Race may be over but my Race to Finish the Office Before Thanksgiving is just getting warmed up.

So Many Staples

Before I could start recovering my chair, I had to first uncover it.

The person that put this chair together must have been paid by the staple.  I spent days pulling out hundreds of staples using a screwdriver and needle nose pliers. 

 

I made sure to note how I took everything off so that I could eventually put it all together.  I piled my removed pieces in the corner and would use those to make my patterns.

Reassembly would mostly be stapling but I had to sew the rolled arms and will have to sew the main cushion as well.

I left a little of the old fabric on in places that I wasn't needing a pattern.  It meant less staples to remove and that was a-okay with me.  Once I got the arms on, I picked up my staple gun and next thing you know it started looking like a chair again.

I had a jammed gun that slowed me down on Wednesday night but by Thursday I was back up and running.  Unfortunately I ran short on fabric.  I forget that more is needed when you have to pay attention to the direction of the fabric pattern.

No worries, additional fabric should be on my doorstep by next Wednesday so hopefully my next chair post will have a completed chair moved back to its home in my office.

Monster Chair

Happy Halloween!  I have been planning and executing an attack on a monster in my house.  A monster chair that is. 

It has been hard to make progress on this side of the office with a giant chenille rusty red chair in my path.  I toyed with getting rid of it but decided it would be more economical to try to work with it.  While at JoAnn's Fabric one day I grabbed a swatch of a fabric that caught my eye.

It was a fun navy houndstooth but a little overpriced.  I was determined to find it online for a better price.  And I thought I had.  But then my fabric came in the mail.

I had accidentally ordered a 44" wide printed fabric.  No bueno.  Not one to be deterred I came up with a solution.  I bought a few $2.00 a yard 72" yards of felt to back my flimsy purchase.

My plan was to use spray adhesive to back the fabric with felt, making it a little more durable.  Here's a sneak peak of what the chair will eventually look like once recovered and back in the room.

Much better that the rusty red, right?  With my fabric problems solved I began on what would become an entire week of staple removal to strip down my chair.  More on that Friday!

Office Curtains

I removed the gold silk curtains before painting the office and luckily I don't have to put those back up.  Instead I went with the IKEA curtains I used in the dining room.  At $9.99 for a set of panels I couldn't pass them up.  I got 3 sets in white and put them up last week.

While I was hanging up the longer curtain rod, I took a dive off the back of my little ladder.  It was not a first but it was a little more painful falling on to hardwoods.  The worst part was that my neighbors were pulling into their driveway, along those windows as I went down.  They may or may not have seen me.  I choose to just stay on the floor for a few minutes until they went inside.  While I was on the floor I noticed the curtains were just a wee too long.  After a long weekend in New Orleans, I came back to tackle this problem.

I used iron on fabric tape and hemmed them in place.  It was a piece of cake and gave all the panels a more tailored look.

Slowly but surely I'm getting this room back together.  I'm working on the desk this week and once that is back things will start feeling a little more complete.