No time for stamping

It's a fine line when you're renting about how much money to spend on furnishing/decorating a house, and it really doesn't help when the landlord provides only some of the window coverings. My thoughts on moving in were that the windows that weren't covered (the kitchen, dining room, and some family room windows) were not going to be a big deal and that they could wait awhile. Well, after living in the house a week, I discovered that I was incredibly uncomfortable with the lack of privacy (as you're approaching the house on the street coming to the street I live on, you could see right into my dining room). I wanted to make sure that whatever we did wasn't permanent and didn't cost too much, so curtains were a must. However, and my husband will laugh at me, I always like things to look nice. After perusing the selection at stores that I like, I was pretty disappointed in the selection, but after a trip to the fabric store, some ideas began to take shape. I will be the first to admit that my sewing skills are lacking. I bought a sewing machine for the purpose of stitching on my cards and scrapbook pages, but I did take a few beginner lessons a couple years ago. So, with much trepidation, I decided to bite the bullet and make my own curtains. Here is a week's worth of work: 

Here is a close up of the fabric I chose for the kitchen area:

There are two steel doors in the kitchen area, so I made these door panels and added some magnetic rods for easy placement. Unfortunately, the dog keeps messing with them, so I'm not so sure about them for now:

My kitchen window is curved at the top, and I didn't want to use a rod outside the window frame because then the curtains would be making their way into the sink. So for now I've got them mounted inside the frame and I will be adding a custom cornice or valance to cover up the arched portion of the window. As pretty as the curved windows look, they're not great when you need to cover them. I also enjoy the view out this window, so I used some Stampin' Up! ribbon to tie them up most of the time.

I found this fabric in the fabric store and fell in love with it. I knew it would look great in my dining room where I needed some more curtains, so I began making these. Hopefully I'll be able to finish them off in the next week or two:

 

I'm also hoping to get some time to stamp soon as I'm really missing it, but I keep underestimating how much work the house needs to be finished. At this point, my dining room table and one of my kitchen counters is covered in tools because we keep needing to hang things. So my project for the next couple days is to complete everything that requires tools so I can reclaim my dining room and kitchen. Then maybe I can stamp. :D