Goal 35. Design a Grown-up, Cozy Living Room

The goal that has been overtaking my life! taking my time this week has been sewing curtains. Since I am still fun-employed I have been working on getting my house set-up and gorgeous during this time.

As part of my goals I had written down the feelings I wanted in each of my rooms, and then to further this intentional decorating I wrote down the functions I wanted each room to play. In my living room I wanted it to be a room to share with others, so I decided to move some things out of it (read: ugly textbooks), and move other things in, such as the board games and DVD's that we would want to share with others. I also am going to be using this room as my "office" space. I haven't figured out how to do this yet, so right now I am just stashing my stuff on a shelf behind doors. Right now it would also be a guest room, as we wait for me to find a job! It is doing a great job of holding all these functions.

Last week I found a great series of posts on the Nesting Place called 31 Days to a Better Dressed Nest. I have been devouring these posts, and trying to use them in my own house. In particular, 2 of her suggestions: Incorporate fabric, and Group it. I decided to hang my curtains and made a grouping of pictures as my focal point. You can see both in the video below and see how I made these curtains.


In terms of reaching the "grown-up, cozy" portion of the goal, I think that the curtains are doing a lot to make this room look like someone took care, and the addition of fabric and colour really do add a sense of coziness. I also really love how the curtain rods coordinate with the table and give it a harmonized look without being overly match-y. The photos also give the room a focal point and again demonstrate care has been taken. I think the major difference between the college kids look and grown-up style is that it looks as though care has been taken to get nice, harmonized items instead of whatever is free. I still think we have a long way to go in totally completing this goal, but this is a great start.

The way that I made the curtains was, as Wendy put it "so basically you're making big tablecloths and then hanging them." Yup! It was the easiest way I could find to do it and it STILL took me all week. I used the IKEA Riktig curtains rings (40 of them!), IKEA Curtain Rods (which Prince Charming hung for me!) and fabric that I bought 2 years ago for my last house! I was so happy that this fabric worked and that I finally used it! I also used a kind of gathering tape, but it didn't have any strings to pull. Here's how I did it:

1. Lay the fabric on my kitchen floor and use it as a cutting guide. I used the whole width of the fabric and cut each length to 236 cm. On the narrower panels I also cut the fabric in half, lengthwise, using the kitchen floor as a guide. (My floor is lino of fake tiles, so it has numerous straight lines!)

2. Pin the tape to the top of the fabric allowing about 1.5" for a hem. I did not cover the whole tape, but just had it seamed into the hem. This was because I didn't think I would have enough fabric, (which was probably true.)

3. Pin the sides. These hems were about 2cm, because I wanted to use the entire width of the fabric. As it was, the 2 larger panels I made didn't quite cover the whole window, so I had to make 2 half-width panels and also hang them beside. I think it still looks good.

4. Iron everything and then sew! I simply used the most basic straight stitch. Prince Charming was mad at this when I showed him all the cool stitches I could do on my machine. So for the bottom hem.... I used a leaf pattern.

5. I hung all the panels and completed them first before doing the hem. I did this like you would hem a dress, by pinning it while it was hanging and then taking them down and sewing. It turned out great, and they just barely brush the floor.

I am really excited about this new project. So I made you a video, because I think this gives you a better view of the whole space! Enjoy! Please excuse the awful quality, this is my first video. But it's super fun!!!


Living Room from Robyn MacLaine on Vimeo.