Nursery Projects!

This week, I've finished two of the projects I needed to complete for the nursery ... one big project and one small.  It is almost complete!

First, for the small project, I did a little redesign of a lamp shade.  This lamp was the one I'd had in college, and I'd spray-painted it for use in Katie Anne's nursery.  I had bought a white shade with pink rick-rack for her nursery, but that obviously wouldn't work for SJ4.  So, my mom had the good idea to try to pick the rick-rack off and see if we could reuse it.  The pink rick-rack came off really easily, so I just hot glued some jumbo red rick-rack around the top and bottom where the pink had been and - voila!  A girl's lamp becomes a boy's lamp in about 15 minutes' time and - best of all - for only $1.38!

Also in that picture are two glass jars I bought for supplies for his changing table/dresser.  I had two small containers in Katie Anne's nursery in the same spot, but I always hated them because they were too tiny and wouldn't really hold anything.  So, I picked up these two at Hobby Lobby for 50% off each one.  The big one is for cotton balls, and I've got to get some gauze squares to go in the little one.  

Now, for the big project - curtains for SJ4's windows.  When I made the curtains and things for KA's nursery, it was really my first adult foray into sewing.  I'd sewn a bit with my mom and grandmother as a child/teen, but making the curtains, table skirt, rocking chair pad, etc. for KA's nursery was my first sewing go-round alone.  So, her curtains now seem very simple to me - just two hot pink panels with one row of medium-sized green rick-rack at the top.  Since I'm a more experienced sewer this time (and I'm not sewing nearly as much for his room), I thought I'd jazz up the curtains in the new nursery.

I think they definitely look more professional and visually interesting than the ones in KA's room, but ... they were a lot more time consuming!  They really weren't hard to do - most of the work was cosmetic, and it was all just straight stitching - but they're so freaking long that they're hard to iron, keep straight while sewing, and not drag all over the floor while I'm working on them.  Also, the gingham had a lot more give than the Kona cotton, so it was tough not to over-stretch the gingham while stitching it.  They generally just became a pain in the rear, and it annoyed me that none of this hard work was for any practical purpose - even though that was exactly my intention in the beginning.  Crazy, I know.  

My goal was to finish them two weeks ago, but I got really tired of working on them the week before vacation, so I had to put them aside for a while.  This week, I've been motivated to complete them - and I was able to find the jumbo black rick-rack that I needed to finish them.  I worked hard on them for the past two days, and they're finally finished!  I bowed on my knees and cried holy when this project was done.  I was so relieved to finish it!  So, his curtains are finally up!  Here are some pictures of them.

Room with curtains open:

Room with curtains closed:

I still need to find tie backs.  The one window (pictured) is so close to the closet wall that the original tie backs I'd bought wouldn't fit.  So, I'm on the hunt.  For now, I'll just push them over to open them.

Same curtain closed:

At the top of the curtains, I did a black polka dot ribbon and edged that with two rows of jumbo white rick-rack:

At the bottom of the curtains, I did a ten inch panel of black and white gingham with red polka dot ribbon edged with two rows of jumbo black rick-rack:

Now, I'm ready to work on SJ4's blanket and Boppy cover!