The Saga Of The Never Ending Kitchen Curtains

Full disclosure:

I’ve made + remade Dutch colonial kitchen curtains

so many times I’ve lost count.

‘Cause that’s how I roll.

This makes G.O. very unhappy,

as he doesn’t grasp the concept of the re-do.

How unfortunate!

Because I can’t seem to do anything

unless there are multiple redo’s!

Let’s think about something more pleasant, though,

+ view the (I think!) final curtains:

P e r f e c t i o n !

I made these from an old, full-length pair**

of Rachel Ashwell’s Simply Shabby Chic at Target,

**which you can still buy.

They were in a bedroom at our last house,

so they’re basically “free”, right?

But wait.

It took me three tries to even get these right!

Here’s attempt number one:

So what’s wrong with those?

Well, I thought they were too full

+ looked like something from the Palace of Versailles!

My solution was to remove 2 of the 4 panels,

+ here’s what that looked like:

In my mind, this was a little better,

but the more I looked at them,

the cheapier they seemed to appear.

They looked like I got them from the dime store!!!

Ha!  That’s right!

I just said dime store!

I’M ANCIENT!!!

But wait — it gets better!

When I had my very first house

when I was probably 19 years old,

I actually did buy bedroom curtains at the dime store!!!

They were called CAPE CODS,

+ I loved them!!!

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

Trust me, the rest of my decor

was pretty hilarious,

but that’s a subject for yet another blog post.

Back to today’s triumph:

I had to get the folds between the rings just right,

+ trust me, as per usual, it wasn’t easy.

Here’s what I did to “train” them:

After carefully folding them,

individually, by hand,

I clipped them in place with chip bag clips

+ let them settle in for about a half hour or so.

Genius!

Whew!

Feeling exhausted, just by reading about it?

Imagine going through it!

And yes, there were other, earlier versions —

 all equally grueling + frustrating for poor G.O.

Here were some red gingham cuties

that I sewed, using an old twin bed skirt

from back in the day when Martha was still at K-Mart:

I don’t recall why these went away,

because I do love that red gingham.

Oh, wait — yes, I remember.

I decided I needed full-length curtains instead of tiers,

so these longer gingham checked curtains

took their place:

Once again, adorable, if I do say so,

but the material was wrong.

I’d ordered fade-resistant indoor-outdoor fabric

from fabric.com,

+ it turned out to be just too heavy + stiff

to make good curtains.

They eventually became upholstery projects,

so they ended well, at least.

Finally — in conclusion,

I still want some red gingham check

in that kitchen of ours,

because I love it so.

This — again from fabric.com:

But how – what – where – when?!?

Stay tuned!

Outdoor Sink/Potting Table

So.

On Friday I bought myself this magazine

at my happy place, Barnes + Noble:

Look at this idea

for an outdoor sink/potting table!

Do you see what’s happening here?

Looks like someone put some legs

on an old sink,

hooked up the faucets to the outdoor spigot

+ placed a galvanized bucket underneath

to catch the drain water.

G E N I U S !

Wow, could we use something similar

next to our back door,

replacing this bench + birdhouse vignette:

Here’s the same space in yet another configuration,

being photo-bombed by Chloe the Dachshund.

As you can see,

we have the galvanized bucket-drain situation handled.

We also had a long, vintage kitchen sink,

similar to the one used in the magazine,

but wouldn’t you know it — we SOLD IT!

Seller’s remorse!

No worries, though.

I bought this vintage cutie at a garage sale for $10!

Sorry for the bad snapshot,

but you get the idea — isn’t it perfect?

Now all we need is a table.

Perhaps G.O. could make one himself,

like this project from last summer,

for which he repurposed an old wooden ironing board top

+ some black pipe from Menards.

Sold it, though!

He could make another large table/island

like this recent project,

made from reclaimed lumber

+ an outboard motor shipping frame.

Turns out we sold that, too,

but we might just still have this old table:

We got it at some long-past flea market

or perhaps another garage sale.

I can’t remember;

nor can I remember if we still have it!

I’ll check, though, so stay tuned!