Skylander
Curtains Part 1:
Winter
Curtains-Water Element
Just like when I realized that my garden lacked true
function, beauty and a cohesive vision. I had the same realization about our
family room. I have been aware that we needed to go further in our attempts for
organization. The controller organizer
was working beautifully. However, this area of our family room working so well
caused the other areas of dysfunction to come into sharper relief.
If I were to create a cohesive theme for decorating while
organizing our family room, what would it be?
Each person in the family is very different and we have always counted
that as a good thing. However, this does pose a problem when you are trying to
design a room that is well organized and visually appealing. I kept thinking about each person in the
family and all I kept coming up with was differences in tastes.
I finally found
two areas of common ground; area number one-the gospel of Jesus Christ and area
number two- gaming. I will put a caveat in area number two, I am not a gamer. I
like to play video games but I am very, very picky about the games I am willing
to play. The rest of my family plays
games together with me often watching while I do a project in the same room.
This is one of the ways we have fun together. They progress the story line ,
level up characters, and make fun of the villain/s together.
I decided to go with the gaming theme for the family room
because it is where we play games. Gospel discussions usually happen in the dining
room. So I went looking on-line for
ideas that would create the organization we needed and be beautiful; “From a
certain point of view” Obi-Wan Kenobi. If you can have function and fun in the
same item then why not?
In the end, I had
pinned a ton of images to my Family Room board on Pinterest. My husband and
kids then went through all the ideas I had come up with for the family room. I didn’t
want to decorate it like just one type of video game, that’s boring for me as
an artist. My husband didn’t want the room to have a little bit from every
single game the family had ever played. We narrowed it down with some compromises.
It would be more than one game inspired but it would stay mostly within
Nintendo games. With the exception of some nerdy stuff that is just too cool to
leave out, for example some Star Wars and Doctor Who decorations we both wanted
to add.
So after analyzing the family rooms dysfunction, the worst
area was the consoles. They are all over the kid’s school desk, which is not
good for doing homework. I decided I wanted
to make some Donkey Kong shelves for organizing the consoles. However, I also
wanted to change the curtains because what I had up currently didn’t remotely
match. There was also the common
complaints of a glare on the tv during gaming.
Since I didn’t know how much space the curtains would need and I didn’t want
the consoles to overheat if the curtains covered them . I decided the curtains
needed to come before the console shelves/organizers.
As a result I started thinking about gaming curtain
designs. I looked around on-line for ideas and I didn’t find anything I liked.
So here is what I came up with for our family room. A valence inspired by the
Skylanders portal. The curtains that
hang from the valence will change once a season and will be inspired by an
element I feel is a good representation of that season in color. The water element was what we both thought
was a good choice for winter curtains.
Before
After
If you are interested in seeing how I made the curtains
and valence read below.
Step#1
I removed the old curtains and then my husband measured how wide our windows are and added
six inches to each side. Then we figured out how much wood we needed to build
the valence boxes. We then bought OSB wood because it didn’t have to be pretty
wood, just sturdy since it was going to be covered.
Step #2
I gathered materials for building the valence boxes.
Step#3
I measured and cut 4 pieces of wood 71” x 6”.
Then
measured and cut 4 pieces of wood 6” x 6”. Then my husband measured and cut 2
pieces of wood 70”x 3”.
Step#4
I screwed the 71”x 6” piece to the 6”x 6” piece on each
end.
Step#5
I then screwed the other 71” x 6” piece of wood to the
pieces of wood that I had already screwed together.
Step#6
My husband centered the piece of wood that measured 70”x
3” above the window and screwed it into the wall. Next my husband screwed in 4 L braces on each pieces of wood.
Step#7
I then took the boxes. I measured and marked a line every
8 ¾” on the front face of the valence boxes.
Step#8
I then cut 14 pieces of foam measuring 4”x 7”.
Step#9
I cut up 4 pairs of worn black jeans.
Then cut enough of
each pant leg to staple the jean down on the sides and staple onto the top and
inside of the valence box.
Step#10
I cut smaller strips of fabric from the jeans and then laid
it on top of the foam I had covered. Then I stapled as close to where I had
stapled on the sides. Then flipped that fabric over and stapled it in place.
Then I repeated the process and filled in the spaces between the foam pieces.
Step#11
I then took a piece of white fabric and laid it along the
edge of the front edge of the valence box behind the foam blocks I had stapled
down. I then stapled it down along the front edge.
I then flipped the stapled
white fabric over and tucked the excess under and stapled it down to the inside
of the valence box.
Step#12
I then took white chalk and drew the symbols that I saw
on the portal onto the pieces of foam. I then painted over the chalk with white
acrylic paint.
Step#13
After the paint had dried my husband then lifted the
boxes onto the L braces he had previously drilled onto the wood above the
windows. He then screwed in the other half of the L braces to the top of the
valence boxes. We got the construction idea for the boxes from me redoing my
parents valence boxes.
Step#14
I then took a bunch of blue jeans that we had been given and cut them up. I then sorted the jeans from darkest to lightest.
Step#15
I took the pant legs and evened them out so that they
were rectangular in nature.
Step#16
I then stitched
the jeans together. I started from darkest pair of jeans then moved slowly to
the lightest pair of jeans. I always ended with the lightest pair of jeans
being on the edge of the curtain that will be in the center of the curtain.
I then squared the front of the curtains.
Step#18
I then laid the top of the curtain on top of my curtain liner
and traced around the edges. I added extra liner fabric at the top to create a
way to finish the curtains off. Then cut out the liner.
Step#19
I then stitched the front to the back.
Materials Cost
Jig saw -already had 0.00
Measuring tape-already had 0.00
Markers-already had 0.00
Gloves-already had 0.00
Googles-already had 0.00
Saw horses- already had 0.00
Screws- left over from another project 0.00
Drill bit- already had 0.00
L braces- 2.00
Pencil- already had 0.00
Foam- left over from another project 0.00
Scissors-already had 0.00
Staple gun- already had 0.00
Black jeans- hand me downs 0.00
Blue jeans- hand me downs 0.00
Staples- left over from another project 0.00
Chalk- already had 0.00
White paint-left over from another project 0.00
Cutting mat- already had 0.00
Rotary cutter-already had 0.00
White thread- left over from another project 0.00
Curtain liner- hand me downs 0.00
Iron- already had 0.00
Square- already had 0.00
OSB 11.00
Total Cost
13.00
No comments:
Post a Comment