Oh Suzani

Since we moved into this house and started tearing down walls and building them back up, I felt I could control the chaos by making lists.  I love lists.  It gets the clutter out of my head and allows me to sleep at night.  For the past seven months, there has been one delinquent item on the list that I could not get rid of.  More accurately, that I could not tackle and complete.  Window treatments.  Those are some sad windows.

HGTV makes it look like you'd have to be a one-armed  drug addict not to be able to "whip" these up.  I didn't think it looked quite so simple.  So I bought fabric and stared at it for a few months.  It was easy to stare at because I love it so.  I got it from Calico Corners, but then found it for a few dollars less at LSFabrics.com.  I love the pattern (the one on the left) and thought it was a good way to break up all of the blue and white.

Then I did what I always do when I have an idea and not a clue how to execute it....I did lots of Internet browsing.  I logged a few hours on YouTube watching the aforementioned confident people creating valance boxes.  Then one day I came home and Dave (surprise, surprise) had whipped some up for me.  Yay!  All I had to do was spray adhesive on the wood, wrap it with batting and then add another layer with the fabric.  Getting the corners to lay flat took some finagling, but it turned out really well.  Oh - and because you can see them outside the house, I had to make sure the inside of the boxes looked perfect, as well.  I made one without documenting it.  Then Dave caught me not working on the second one.  I was tired!

He shamed me into doing the second one.

So much stapling.

We hung them up and they look fabulous. 

I have a ton of extra fabric so I can make pillows for the bay window.   You're probably wondering how I think I'm going to do that.  I bought a sewing machine and I'm taking Sewing 101 next week where we're making a pillow.  My cousin is going to take it with me so it's not quite as daunting.  Blog post to follow!