From Old Curtains to New

Remember that old shed that Frank tore down? Well, the new shed has windows, just like it’s neighbor, and all this time, it has gone without curtains.

When we lived in Alaska and worked out in the bush, we bought a condo in Anchorage. It had lots of windows. Instead of buying curtains, we bought material and I made them. When we moved to Oklahoma, we brought the curtains with us, but have only used one of them in the house. That means I have quite a few ‘old’ curtains in the sewing room just waiting to be put to use.

When we got the first storage building, we decided to use some of the old curtains to cover the windows. This will help keep out sunlight and prying eyes.

The new shed has been here a while, but I had yet to get the curtains made for it. Yesterday the temperature here was 82 degrees with a stout south wind. Today it is 36 degrees with a very chilly north wind. It’s a good day to work on curtains. I went out and measured the curtains we put in the first building to determine the size. Then I got out the old curtains and started measuring. The first one was an easy cut.

The second one was going to require a little more work since I had already cut out the easy pieces. I figured I would have to take apart a panel to get the pieces I needed, but my frugal Frank came in an eyeballed the pieces I had and found a better way. By taking two smaller pieces and removing an extra strip that was attached to an old seam, I could make the last curtain. It didn’t take much extra work, and as Frank put it, “This will leave more usable leftover material for another project some other time.” He’s right.

So, now I have two more curtains waiting for a little warmer weather to hang. We tried to find more small, flush fitting curtain rods like we used the first time, but haven’t been able to. Time to go out and rummage through the bits and pieces of hardware we always save. We want to see what we can find to hang these curtains with. It’s a good time to get more ideas of different ways to do things.

There are so many ways to make do with what you have. Sometimes we wonder about why we keep some old things around, but it’s surprising what we find to use them for. Like old curtains. 

Until next time – Fern

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