Sheet Curtains

My little baby has become such a better napper!!! When I first had him, I swore that people were lying when they said that babies slept all the time...mine didn't!! I am trying to get him used to taking a long nap in the afternoon.  If you know us and our house, having too much light is not something you will ever hear me complain about.  This is the darkest house I have ever lived in! We have enough windows, I just think that the way the house faces makes for poor natural lighting.  But of course, Ethan's room is the brightest room in the entire house. That makes for not so great naps in there. He has really become accustomed to sleeping in his crib which is wonderful, but I just can't lay him down in there for naps because he doesn't get a full rest like he needs (and mom needs :).  So I have been trying to think of a way to make inexpensive curtains. I wanted to keep the natural light in there for 98% of the day, but when he naps I wanted to have the option to close the curtains. So the closet searching began. We are not big users of the top sheet on our bed.  Whats that for anyway? Its not thick enough to add warmth and its just one more thing that gets rumpled up at the end of the bed by morning. We usually just make the bed without it these days.  So we have 5 unused sheets that are just sitting in the closet. I decided to make them into something useful! I took one queen size sheet, measured to both ways.  It was longer one way than the other. I took the longest dimension and made that my top and bottom hem.  I cut off the top of the sheet so you wouldn't see that.

Then I folded my sheet in half.  I cut along that fold.

  Then I took one of the pieces and folded it in half again. I also cut along that fold and did this again on my other piece of sheet.

This gave me four pieces.  I will admit I would have liked to had more fullness and probably should have quit being stingy and just used one sheet per window...but stingy is how I do it!  I then hemmed up any bare edges.  For the edges that were already hemmed from the sheet, I just left those alone....less work the better! Then I tried to iron out the "sitting in the closet for 5 years" wrinkles....tried is the key term here. In a perfect world, I would have washed them first and then hung them but who has the time!  I remember when I worked at the JCPenney Home Store, I had little old ladies come in and tell me they would wash and iron their sheets every week.  WOW.  I'm glad that is one tradition that hasn't stuck around. Anyway, I was able to finish one window in about 45 minutes and the next window is on tomorrows to do list.

They look really thin in the picture but actually it cuts the light in half when they are closed.  I think this would be a great project if you really like a bedding set but can't afford the way.too.expensive.matching drapes.  You could buy the matching sheets and make a set yourself!  I almost made my curtains from a really cute stripe sheet set we have, but I couldn't bear to cut them up just yet. I know at places like Big Lots you can buy a queen size sheet set for around $20 or less.  My cost for todays project...FARRREEEEEE!!!!  I bet we are the only house on the block that has 350 thread count curtains!! Don't be jealous :)