DIY: Quick and Easy Window Curtains

Are you tired of the afternoon sun beating through your windows and heating up your home? Save money on your utilities with these quick and easy curtains that you can make yourself in a single afternoon.

I decided that blocking out the sunlight in the living room of my home might help keep down our summer utility bills. We have several large windows in that room and I didn’t want to spend a lot on curtains, so I developed this quick easy way to make curtains. They look really nice and they made a huge difference on our utility bills.

Measure Your Windows ~
To make your easy, quick curtains, first you will need to measure your windows. Most standard household windows are around 2½ feet wide, but the height may vary quite a bit. Make sure you measure in both directions. If you are doing curtains for several windows in a room, or for all the windows in your house, make sure you measure all the windows, as they may vary just a bit from window to window.

Choose Fabric ~
Once you know your measurements you can head to ther fabric store or your local discount store that has a fabric area, such as Walmart or Target. Standard fabric comes off the bolt in widths of either 42 inches or 60 inches. If your windows are within a few inches of 42 inches I suggest you use that size. There will be a lot less cutting and measuring.

You will want you curtains to gather just a bit, so they will actually need to be slightly longer than you window is wide. You will also need a couple of inches for going around the curtain rod, so add about 4 inches to the measurement that you took and then add a few inches to allow for the gathering. If you want a lot of gathers so they look kind of fluffy and frilly at the top then you want to add more. You might even use the 60 inch fabric.

Ask the person cutting your fabric to cut it in lengths that are as long as your window height plus about 4 inches more. So for instance, if you have a window that’s 30 inches tall you would want fabric that is the whole 42 inches across, and then 34 inches long, if you are using 42 inch fabric. Most stores will go ahead and cut it for you into the lengths that you want while it is still in the store. That will save you a lot of cutting time when you get home.

Build the Top Tunnel ~
On the top of each piece of fabric you’ll be using for your curtains, fold over about 2 inches towards the back. Then sew two lines across that folded over section. The first stitch should be about a half an inch down from the fold line. The second stitch should be a quarter inch up from the edge of the fabric that was folded over. This will leave you with about an inch and a quarter hollow ‘tunnel’ between your two stitch lines. Both of the stitch lines go all the way from side to side across the top of the fabric.

Bottom Hem ~
On the bottom edge of each curtain fabric piece, fold up about half an inch and run a single stitch line all the way across from side to side. This will be your bottom hem and it will keep it from unraveling when it goes through the washing machine later, (which sooner or later it will need to).

Curtain Rods ~
Check your local discount store, (such as Walmart or Target), for curtain rods. They’re typically less than a dollar a piece, and they go up very easily. Each of them has two little brackets that go one on each side of the top of your window frame. Each bracket goes in by just tapping in two little nails.

Once you tap those two brackets into place, slide the metal piece of the curtain bar through the tunnel that you left at the top of your curtain fabric. Move the gathers around until it looks the way want and then click the edges of the curtain bar into the brackets that you installed on either side of the windows. Repeat for each additional window.

That’s all there is to it. You made your own curtains! Just three stitch-lines per curtain and a bit of nailing for the brackets, they look very nice, and you did it all yourself. Great Job!

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