Hand-Me-Down Skills

I love hand-me-downs, I always have.  Some hand-me-downs are better than others though and handing down knowledge is one of the most valuable and meaningful things I think we can do.  When I was about twelve, my grandmother and my mother taught me how to sew.  As far as I know, most of the women on my mother's side of the family sewed.  I was so proud to finally be let into the club.  I got to go to the store, pick out my pattern and fabric and make my very first outfit.  I wore it to church  Easter morning and I was so proud.

Well, my daughter is now eight.  She's been around me and seen me sewing all sorts of things; slipcovers and curtains for the house, a flower girl dress for Grandma's wedding, Halloween costumes.  She's dabbled with scraps before but I wanted to let her into the 'club' so last summer we went to the store, she picked out a pattern she wanted to make and she got to pick out whatever fabric she wanted.  She helped me cut the pattern out and it went into a bag to be sewn later.  Well, later was a lot longer than I'd planned.  We never got around to it last summer.  A couple of weeks ago I pulled the bag out and decided it was time to finish the project.  Now, she's a little young to use the sewing machine all on her own so she got to sit in the driver's seat and learn how to operate the foot pedal.  I guided the fabric through the machine while giving the commands to stop and go.  It was interesting to say the least but she got confidence from the experience and wasn't so frustrated that she would be turned off sewing because it was too difficult.

   

Here she is learning the fine art of seam ripping.  Excuse the state of the office, we made an event out of it and there were snacks required and breaks for doodling on paper and so forth.   Once the top was almost complete I had her try it on.  As you can imagine, a project that was cut out one summer and then sewn together the following spring may not exactly fit properly.  Obviously she'd grown and the top had now become a 'belly top'.  She was thrilled, I was not.  This was an opportunity however to learn another important skill.  How to deviate from a pattern and make things up as you go along.  Like I explained to her, once you know what you're doing (sort of) you can change things.  It doesn't have to be exactly like the pattern says.  That way you'll always have something completely unique and even if someone else makes the exact same thing with the exact same supplies, yours will be different.  I added a six inch ruffle to the bottom of the top and it turned out great.

When we were shopping for the fabric she insisted on purchasing large fuchsia gems to sew onto the top.  I thought it was a horrid idea, but let her buy them because she was being creative.  What do you know, her idea was a good one.  I think the jewels look great and I'm so proud to have worked together with her to pass down a family tradition that seems to be falling by the wayside nowadays.

Evolution of an Office Pt. 1

I've been away from the blog for so long you'd think I wasn't working on anything.  Nothing could be further from the truth. I've been working on lots of different projects.  The problem is that I haven't yet finished anything to a standard that I want to share it.  I've been removing wallpaper, tiling, patching drywall, painting, sewing, cleaning out and building.  Today I decided I'll share part of the transformation of my upstairs office.  The picture above is what the office looks like now.  If you're thinking to yourself  'That's not really all that exciting'.  Have a look at how the room started out...

 This is what it looked like shortly before I moved in. Wall to wall pink shag carpet, wallpaper on all four walls that was stained and yellowing.  None of the stuff in the room is mine but that doesn't mean that I did much better.  Here's what it looked like after I moved in but before I started working...

Granted, there was a short period of time between those two photos where I'd totally cleaned out the room and it was used as a guest bedroom.  It had an antique 3/4 rope bed, two bedside tables and a chest at the end of the bed.  I never got a picture of that, unfortunately.  Here's what it looked like as I was working on the transformation...

I've removed the carpet to reveal the hardwood floor and the wallpaper is gone, leaving only the lovely purple paint that had been underneath.  The walls were in terrible shape and needed a ton of patch work.  I'm not sure what I dislike more, removing wallpaper or patching drywall.  It's not so much the patching that I hate, it's the sanding afterwords.

Once the walls were prepped I painted them with Boomerang's latex, pearl finish recycled paint in what I think is called 'Stone Grey'.  I'm not sure since the colour isn't listed on their website.  The paint was beautiful to work with, nice and thick and covered really well.  If you're not familiar with Boomerang, they basically take recovered domestic paint and stains (aka leftovers) and mix them together to create uniform colours that you can buy super cheap.  I think some colours may be better than others as I used another of their paints in my hallway and stairs and it was a lot more runny and splattered all over.  I also primed and painted all the wood moldings in the room white and removed the door.

I'm not yet ready to share a full view of the room.  I still have to get rid of two large bookcases along one wall, including all the books they currently hold, slipcover two client chairs and get photographs printed and framed for the walls.  Also, I need to somehow get rid of the carpet tape residue that just will not come off the hardwood, finish inside the closet for office storage and repaint the closet door.

What I will share is the making of my valance for the window over part of my desk.  I knew exactly what I wanted for that window as soon as I knew I was putting my office in that room.  I wanted a box pleated valance in grey and white.  I ended up choosing IKEA's Stockholm Blad fabric, not because it was my favourite but because it was the only grey and white fabric they had in stock the day I finally broke down and committed to purchasing fabric for the office.  I'm glad I got it in retrospect.  It doesn't match perfectly and I think that's part of the charm.  The photo above shows the only new items I used to make the valance.   The fabric, thread and a package of pre-made white piping that I splurged on so I didn't have to sit around making my own.  The lining I used was once a bed sheet and then it had been re-purposed for a craft project.  One day I'll have to share photos of my sewing trunk.  It's like the proverbial treasure chest.  I don't throw fabric supplies out if I think there's even the slimmest of possibilities that it could be useful some time in the future.  I also used the bedsheet/craft project lining to make faux piping when I realized that I wanted to have white piping on both the bottom and the top of the valance (but didn't want to drive to the store or spend the extra $2 on another package).

Normally a box pleated valance would have a solid framework underneath.  I was going to build a structure out of scrap wood for mine but realized I'd used all the appropriate scraps on another project.  So, I found an adjustable curtain rod in the 4th bedroom (which is where all the boxes from the before picture went) and nailed some small scraps of 1"x2"'s together to build it out enough that the roller shade could still operate with the valance over top.











I screwed the blocks to the wall above the window and painted them out to match the walls so my mish-mash drapery hardware wouldn't be so noticeable on closer inspection.

I then attached the curtain rod brackets, put up the rod and covered the face of the rod with sticky back Velcro.  This meant I wouldn't have to sew a rod pocket into the valance, it would look somewhat more authentic even with the pieced together hardware and I could still remove the whole thing for washing.  I didn't have to buy the Velcro either.  I have two rolls of the stuff (one of each male and female sides) in my sewing chest from ages and ages ago when I had a business making custom soft furnishings.  It pays to not throw some things out.

I won't go through the step by step details of sewing the valance as I didn't take any photos of the process.  In it's simplest terms you get a long rectangle of fabric and make pleats at even intervals and sew them in place.  You don't have to line it or add piping like I did.  Once the valance was sewn, I stuck the Velcro to the back side and hung it up.

Once the valance was done I took a photo of that side of the room so I could blog about it and then realized that my printer cart shelves were all messy and it didn't look nice.  Since I don't have time to make organizer trays for all my supplies at the moment (and I obviously don't want to buy any) I measured the opening on the cart and cut another piece of fabric the same size adding one inch to the width for side hems and four inches to the length for the bottom hem and the top lip.  Once the side and bottom hems were done I simply zig zag stitched across the top hem to prevent fraying and stuck on yet more Velcro.  I stuck the corresponding Velcro to the underside of the opening and voila!  A curtain to hide the supply shelf mess.

 


Now if only I'd come up with some way to get rid of all those cords......

New-ish Curtains...Finally!

Last, but not least, is my final project to date.  CURTAINS!  We've lived here almost a year and I've been living with the sheers (I have a thing against wall to wall pleated sheers) that were left here by the previous owner.  I only have one picture of them from when I was doing the last walk through of the house before purchasing.  Here's what they looked like then...

So, pretty much standard wall to wall sheerness.  After about nine months I got tired of the cat getting tangled in them while jumping on and off the windowsill and other bothersome things and I chopped them off at the height of the sill which prompted people to ask if I was OK or not because my curtains looked as though they'd been attacked by rabid shears.  The other day I reached the point where I'd just had enough.  Enough staring at those ragged, chopped up ugly sheers, enough of people thinking that I was happy to just live with curtains that looked like that, and mostly enough of having to choose privacy or light, never both.  I wanted to be able to see the sky and let in light and NOT have anyone and everyone be able to watch me like I was a zoo exhibit!  It didn't matter that I didn't have a sewing machine, I wasn't going to wait around to borrow one.  I went out and bought some sash rods and was determined to fix the window one way or another.  Originally I had planned on using tension rods.  Actually, originally I had planned on sewing some gorgeous bottom up and top down roman blinds but not only was that so low on the money list it would have taken forever to get the green light, it would have required a ton of time and tools.

So, on to plan B.  Gathered curtains that left the upper 1/4 of the window open to let in light and allow me to see the trees and sky and not make me a zoo exhibit.  As a side note let me say this; curtain rods vary in price, sometimes quite a lot.  Shop around before buying or you may feel ripped off later on.  The fabric store by me had sash rods for $12/pair, including mounting hardware.  The tension rods in the same size were about the same price for just one.  I needed a total of 8 rods (or 4 sets of 2 pairs).  Luckily I found them at a very large chain store for $3.50/pair.  I saw them later at the dollar store for $1/pair but they were not available in the size I needed so I didn't feel bad.

I have PVC window frames, not wood and I didn't really want to do anything permanent to them (like drill holes for mounting hardware) which posed a dilemma for hanging the rods.  I had a moment of inspiration and decided to try out using 3M adhesive strips to mount the hardware.  I trimmed the strips to fit and they looked like this...

   Then I just measured where I thought I wanted them to be height wise and stuck them to the window frame the same way you'd hang a hook or picture hanger and being sure to clean the area with rubbing alcohol before I started.  Hard to believe but it actually worked!  I love, LOVE 3M products!!  I knew I'd made the right choice when, after I'd hung the curtains to check for fit, I realized I'd mounted the top rods lower than I liked.  I was able to remove the hardware, stick on new adhesive strips and voila, all better.  But I'm getting ahead of myself.

On to the curtains.  I decided that to really be thrifty, save money and recycle all at the same time, I'd re-use the sheers that were already on the window.  I'm so glad I did, saved me money and I doubt you'd be able to guess when you see the finished window.  I chopped them off right below the header tape that made the pinch pleats, trying to be a straight as possible without actually measuring anything.  Then I got out the iron and fished out the iron on hem tape from my sewing crate.  I hadn't used that in years! I don't have any photos of this part but basically all I did was cut each curtain (there were two panels) in half to create four panels, one for each small window that makes up the bow window in the living room.  Then on each panel I folded over the top edge 1/2" and pressed with the iron.  Then I folded that over again about 2-3" (still no measuring) and pressed with the iron.  Like this...

Then you insert the hem tape between the top and bottom layer, keeping it right at the edge, and iron the fabric sandwich.  There should be a bottom layer of fabric, hem tape then top layer of fabric.  Don't iron directly on the hem tape itself or it will just melt all over your iron.  Once you've done this there should now be a pocket at one end of your fabric.  This is where the curtain rod goes.  As someone who used to run a business sewing home furnishings, this project was so much fun.  It broke every rule I ever made for myself and took so much less time to complete than actual sewing, plus not measuring took a lot of the stress away.  Now, put curtain on one of the rods and hang it on the window.

Thread the fabric between the lower rod and the window and it will look like the photo above.  This is how you'll get the correct measurement for the lower hem without actually measuring.  Now, pull the lower edge of the fabric up (not too hard, just snug) and pin in place over the lower rod.  It will look like this...

Take the curtain off the rods carefully and, without removing the pins,  iron the folded over lower edge.  You now know how long your curtain has to be.  Take the pins out, trim off the excess fabric eyeballing about 2-3" from the folded lower edge and follow the same steps used to make the rod pocket for the top.  You now have a curtain that should be exactly the right size for your rod placement.  You can also hem the sides of the curtains but if they're gathered as much as mine are no one will notice if you leave the edges raw.   It just so happened that when I cut the curtains into four panels to make this project, each panel was almost exactly three times the width of individual windows.  That's perfect for this type of curtain.  Less fabric width means less gathers and more see through.  More fabric width means more gathers and less see through.

If you want a more casual look you can just use a rod at the top and the bottom pocket just becomes a hem.  Here's what the two different versions look like finished.

I like the more formal look using two rods, plus it keeps the dog, cat and my daughter from crawling under the curtains to watch squirrels, bark at passing people or draw on the windows with window writers (you can figure out who does what).

Of course, since this is my life, less than 24 hours after deciding to go ahead with this project I was out shopping and saw a deal on sewing machines that simply could not be ignored and I came home with this...

 

The new sewing machine meant that I could now go back and sew over all the seams that I had just made using hem tape.  The good news is that now that I've sewn everything, these curtains are completely washable.  I'm not entirely sure if you can wash items attached with hem tape or if the glue simply dissolves in the water.  I guess you'd have to check the package.  Plus, since all the hard work was already done, it didn't take long at all to get the sewing out of the way.  The 3M adhesive is still hanging in there, over 48 hours later, so I think it's on there for good.  I wasn't sure how it would hold up with the added tension from the curtain, but it's been remarkably strong.  Total cost for this project (not including the price of the sewing machine) was $15.  I already had the hem tape on hand as it comes with certain curtains you buy and I don't throw anything out if I think I'll use it some time before I die.  I have privacy, I have light, no more ugly ratty curtains and I spent next to no money.  How great is that? 

Sofa Before and "After"

I've been trying to catch up on some photo archiving of my recent projects while the weather is not so hot.  I can't work with my tools outside and want to still feel productive.  So, I'm going to share the before and somewhat after's of my sofa.  I'm not yet completely satisfied with the result and therefore I refuse to consider it finished.  Two years ago I was living in England (while I was still married).  Space was even more of an issue than it is for me now.  In fact, the house I currently live in I would have considered big while we were living over there.  There was no way to fit a three seater sofa in the living room and, desperate to find a solution to the tricky space, I had been searching for a modular option that wasn't so modern looking that I couldn't live with it in my house.  Don't get me wrong, I like modern decorating, I find it quite Zen.  Minimalist, clean lines, chrome, leather,  I like it, I just can't live in it, doesn't suit my lifestyle.  We moved around quite a bit then and never knowing what the next place would look like, I wanted something that could be adapted to many different spaces.  The search took years, only because everything I liked was way out of my price range.  Finally I found this on eBay...

 I know, it's pretty hideous.  Who knows, maybe someone else would have loved it as it was but I didn't.  However, it had potential.  Five separate slipper style chairs that could be arranged in any number of configurations to fit any space.  It didn't matter if we moved to some medieval building with a tiny spiral staircase, these could fit pretty much anywhere.  They were listed as 'vintage' or some such appealing label but really they were just old, I'm guessing sixties-ish.  They were also listed in excellent condition.  The price was ridiculous at what would have converted to about $800CAD but we were going through sofas like no one's business and this was the only thing on offer.  I went for it.

When they arrived I realized that the person who listed them told a few little lies about these 'vintage' pieces.  Firstly, they absolutely stank of cigarette smoke.  It was rancid and took forever to get rid of.  Second, the fabric was practically threadbare and the foam was starting to turn to dust and come through the weave.  They were also so low to the ground it felt rather silly to sit on them, especially with casters instead of legs.  You'd drop into it and roll sideways when you sat down wrong.

When we moved back to Canada in 2008 I brought the pieces with me because I'd never had the chance to finish this project and I was determined to see it through.  Shortly before leaving England I'd found fabric on eBay to recover the sofa and it seemed a shame to have to get rid of it all.  I'd scored two 25m rolls of upholstery weight beige chenille, that's 50m all together, and I paid aprox. $40 a roll for it.  It somewhat made up for the crazy price of the sectional.

Last year, while I was searching for a house, I started to work on the sofa because I suspected that once we moved I'd be so busy with other things I wouldn't have time to do it.  I was very right.  I really wanted to strip them down to bare bones and re-upholster them correctly with new materials.  I couldn't afford to do that so I had to compromise.  To see the entire work in progress as well as the total cost vs. buying new or professional re-upholstery check out the rest of my post, after the jump...