I am sitting here after several hours of getting the old curtains down…finding I really need to dust and clean up high and then…putting up my new DIY curtains.

How to Make Your Living Room Fabulous with DIY Curtains

It’s like this is how they should have been…all along.

We are blessed with such lovely, large picture windows in our living room and these gorgeous old French doors…they all bring in such light! How they are decorated and framed with curtains makes the room’s decor come together.

I love our old windows – I love seeing the world through wavy glass…seeing the garden outside and the lovely trees. At times, however we want privacy – so curtains and blinds are what we need.

The French doors have a beautiful multi-paned transom above. At night and during the day when we don’t want glare on the T.V. the doors and windows need to be covered.

Before, I had lovely swags over the tops of the windows. This is a very easy way to add decor to your windows.

Then we added curtains to cover the doors at night. I love red toile and these added to the charm of the room…when the walls were golden and even when the walls were gray. But, the majority of the colors in the room are now more serene in blues and grays. The red toile just didn’t go with the new color scheme.

I knew I needed a change for this room. New Curtains. As with most things, I wanted them to be DIY. I wanted them to be a mixture between farmhouse and classic…

I also wanted them to be budget friendly. I love shopping for fabric at a fabric warehouse. They have annual sales where they sell the fabric by the pound. This fabric pattern is a few years old…it is from the Magnolia Home line. The neutral grays are perfect and the pattern is soft and elegant.

 

How I made these DIY curtains.

• Measure the height and width of the area for the curtains – and determine where the curtain rod will be.
• I made simple panels and attached shower curtain hooks so that they slide nicely over the rods
• The rods are two long 8 foot rods and one that was six feet long – we cut about 15 inches off – a little from each.
• I wanted the smallest rod in the center – I used screws that are intended to connect dowel to create a long curtain rod.
• I spray painted the dowels with white paint – with a gloss so that they would be smooth. I did sand between coats.
• I used extended curtain rod supports so that the curtains extend a little bit away from the windows and the doors

This was pretty easy except for the part where I had to screw into the old wood – that was a bit tough. Though once that was done, I was able to hang the curtains, after ironing, I connected the dowel rod ends after hanging the curtains.

And there they are!

I love the look now! I love the serene pattern. Making your own curtains is not that hard, especially if you simply make panels. You can use clips or hooks to attach to the rods.

Do you like to make your own curtains? What style do you prefer?

Now that I have these done…I have a couple more changes to make and perhaps change the decor a bit – for the season…