Family Room Curtains.... Finally.

My family room bow window has been nekkid since christmas for a little while. While my Mum was here over winter we took down the boring Ikea curtains, washed them and then they sat folded in my sewing room forever, waiting to be rejuvenated.  

I  love to re-purpose, so when we moved in to our house and the previous owners had left some boring adequate Ikea curtains behind, I decided I would keep them until I found something I liked better.

This is what the curtains used to look like:

...and now:

Don't mind Kevin's lap top in the corner, he looked comfy on the couch so I didn't want to move him...

Yes, curtains, not too exciting, I know. I am happy with them because I was able to re-purpose something FREE in to something pretty, and remember my fabric from my post back in february? There is the green and gold stripe in all it's glory. Green is not my favorite colour, but, it is a close third and it goes with the room.. plus it only cost me about 8$ for the transformation.

I made tie-backs to match, I also bought some plain green of the same fabric, and good thing I did because I used everything but a 8"x12" piece of the valance fabric... and I wanted wide tie-backs.

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So here is a brief "How To" 

(I don't want to insult anyones intelligence)

For an 11' span, I used 4 standard size Ikea curtain panels, and sewed 2 of them together for each side of the window. I had 2 meters of of valance fabric (you will need the same amount of lining) and another 1/4 meter  of a coordinating (or of the same fabric if you like) for the tie backs.

Here is the underside of the valance, I lined them with a thin and cheap polyester, just to give stability.

 As you can see above, I have a wooden dowel as a curtain rod, mainly because its an 11' span and I couldn't find a long enough curtain rod or one stable enough not to bow in the middle.

I really didn't want to have to hang 2 dowels just to have a valance, and I didn't make the curtains in the rod pocket style because the rod holders would make the curtain hang funny.

My solution was to attach the valance to the curtains as is.

Take your finished valance  and face good side of valance to the back side (side toward the window) of the curtain and sew a straight stitch along and it will look like the picture above....

When you put up your curtains flip the valance over to the front and it will be nice and finished looking.

 ...the back of the curtains still look like that...

Now you have your valance attached... easy as can be.

So pretty and shiny....

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Below is a picture my Mum took of the old windows... it was kind of a surprise, the boys changed the windows while I was at work so I only have mid-reno photos. We used to have 3 windows on the left, we filled in the side window (it looked at our neighbors anyway) and made a bigger hole for the new bow window.

...much better now, I think.
I love my Bow window, Kevin along with my Dad and his Dad, installed the windows last year, and the bow window was a mis-size so it was practically free for us. Another one of my favorite windows in the house, you can lay on the couch and watch the world go by.

Another project down, 9 million more to go.

 Happy Sewing!
-Courtney Soleil

Dog Coats - Refashioned from Human Coats

I'M BACK! I know it has been forever since I posted - I apologize but I was having too much fun recovering from surgery (ok, recovering yes, fun no...). Now I am back and thought I better post some things I have been working on.

Dudley's Coat

Since Alberta is pretty much the coldest place I have ever been I figured my dogs think so too (you'd think they'd be used to it..), so I made them both doggy coats! I made Dudley's coat first because well, he basically sits outside and shivers all winter - and Sam would rather lay in a snow bank instead of her bed.
I have bought countless coats for Dudley and they never quite fit right and when the dogs play the cheaply made coats don't stand up long - at 40-90$ a coat I can't afford to keep replacing them!
I took one of my old coats and an old fleece zip sweater, fitted it to Dudley (I didn't want it to gape and have him pee on it...), then used the fleece for the bottom and the winter jacket on the top.

 Under the chest, nice and snug.

 I even made leg covers so he is as covered up as can be without limiting his movement (wouldn't want to hinder his squirrel chasing abilities....). I couldn't make a belly strap because boy dog anatomy makes it difficult and I didn't want the back of the coat flying up - the solution was leg straps that velcro together on the inside of the thighs. Voila!

 I put his name on it in case he gets lost (not likely, but its cute..).

Ok, this last one is mainly because he is so darn adorable, but you can see I used velcro on the neck to keep the zipper from slipping down.

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Samantha's Coat

With Sam's coat I didn't need to make it super warm, just needed more of a wind breaker/water repeller. It was important I make Sam's coat more of a "working" coat, we are going to put Sam in training for Search and Rescue (hopefully) and we wanted her to have something functional.

 I bought a adult large sized rain coat from Value Village (cost a whole 3$ !) and refashioned it to fit Sam. I sewed up the original arm holes (they were in the wrong spot...) and made new ones, they are large because Sam runs like lightning and I had to put function first. I used black bias binding to finish the arm holes off. I was able to use the original zipper and snaps and just had to make a rear cut out for her back legs, I also was able to include the original pockets and hide-able hood (rolls in to the collar).

 I took a cheap reflective vest I had on hand and used some pieces of reflective tape on the back.

 (isn't she beautiful?????)

 To correct the angle and have a nice finish I took a scrap of the orange vest and appliqued it on.

 It honestly fits so great! I was very happy with how it turned out. Don't worry, now that I have an embroidery machine I will be putting her name on the coat too, when I will do I will make another post.

The reflective tape is awesome, you can litaraly see it reflect an extreme distance from a light source - I am considering putting some on Dudley's coat too for when I take him running... we will see. 

Feel free to email me if you have any questions.

Happy Sewing and Repurposing! 

-Courtney Soleil