Make do or go without -- or give into the sun

When it comes to home decor, I am cheap and picky. (Well, to be completely honest, when it comes to every purchase, I'm cheap and picky.) I have the attitude that if I can't find what I like for the right price point, I simply won't buy it.

Which explains why I've lived in this apartment for close to five years and until early this morning, had no living room curtains.

But it's getting scorchingly hot in Pittsburgh. We're hitting record temps most days of the week, and the sun beating down on my living room has simply been intolerable. So I decided that I needed curtains. And I needed curtains that AbbyCat wouldn't destroy.

The criteria:

1. Be adjustable, so that I could raise and lower them based on the amount of sun, and the tenacity of AbbyCat. 
2. Be able to be placed on a tension rod; I'm not installing a curtain rod just to take it down in a year. 
3. Coordinate not only with this apartment, but with the living room in whatever house I buy next year; I don't want to set my decorating standards next year based on a cheap curtain today. 
4. Cost less than $25 a panel. 

It's amazing how you can't find curtains that fit these criteria. I don't want flat panels because they can't be adjusted, and it's basically an open invitation to AbbyCat to come play and destroy. Likewise, traditional blinds can't go on a tension rod.

Which brought me to Pinterest, and the idea of Roman shades. While I didn't like the ones in this tutorial because they couldn't be adjusted, it gave me a jumping off point and led me toward Butterick 5159.

This would give me the best of both worlds -- I could hopefully control fabric costs, and get nice adjustable curtains with minimal opportunity for AbbyCat destruction.

 I initially hoped to lower the cost of fabric by buying a tablecloth and deconstructing it. No luck: I simply couldn't find tablecloths that were below my price point ($25 was what I had determined I would need for the main part of the curtain) and were attractive. I wanted something in a light color with a print, and it had to be 60x84 so that I could get two panels out of it.

When that didn't work, I went back to the quilting section at Joann. I had seen some fabrics there that I liked, but they were a little pricey. I did some more digging, though, and found two other prints that were just as nice, but half the cost. They'll still meet the requirement to fit in a house next year, but weren't spendy enough that I'd feel guilty about making new ones.

A couple of modifications to the pattern:

• I made 30-inch curtains instead of the minimal 36. My windows weren't big enough to make the 36, and I didn't want to go full-width, since I wanted to adjust individually. 
• They're on tension rods instead of the outside bracket that the pattern required. This didn't take any effort to change. 
• Instead of putting the ribbons eight inches from the fabric edge, they're six inches from the edge. 

I would definitely make this pattern again, and am keeping it in my stash so that when I move next year, I can make more using the same valance and panel structures. The dowel at the base keeps the middle from sagging, and overall makes it look nice and polished. Plus, I got to buy a hacksaw to trim the dowels to the right length!

From start to finish, it probably took me about three hours -- and the most complicated part was adjusting the tension rod so it fit without sagging. I don't like how the fabric seems to wrinkle so easily, but I'm hoping that time and hanging will get rid of that. If AbbyCat ends up pulling the rod down, I'll spray starch them before putting them back up, but ironing alone is not worth the energy to mess with that rod again.

They're definitely doing their job. Because the fabric is light colored, they let in light without blocking it -- but also without allowing the sun to beat in at full force.

Ideas for when I make them again:

• I want to possibly do a different color for the lining on the back, just so it doesn't look like (from the street) I just stuck a bedsheet up. 
• I'd also want to stick with a similar color theme between the valance and the main panel, just to give it more continuity.

One way to keep AbbyCat cool in the summer.

And the interesting side effect: AbbyCat won't go near them. She's been glaring at me all morning, and I suspect she's actually afraid of them. She'll figure it out at some point, but maybe in the meantime it'll cut down on the cat hair on the couch.