I love burlap, the texture, the colors, the endless possibilities. Yes I love burlap! I’ve have this roll I’ve been hanging onto for almost a year now (procrastination much!?!?…. Nope just very indecisive!!)

(I actually bought it to make to make a ruffled table cloth for our 10 year anniversary, but decided not to)
So after months of pinning and pondering I came across these beautiful curtains I’m not able to see who made them:( but I love the look of them! I considered doing lace/shear ruffles on my burlap but decided against it than by complete accident I stumbled across The Caldwell Prodject and she has a wonderful tutorial on exactly the curtains I want IN BRULAP!!! I’m sew excited about this project. I haven’t been able to bring myself to decide on curtains since we bought our house 4 years ago! (Yep I got problems) I have this awesome bay window in my front room, and I’ve been dreaming of curtains that would be perfect for this area:)

(Sorry about the terrible lighting)

So first thing I did was measure how long I wanted my curtains to be and cut my burlap.

(These first steps are quite hairy, literally)
To cut the burlap straight you pick a thread, I like to cut on each side of it to get it out.

Then pull it. I pull some then gather and scrunch the burlap to the other end and make a small v like clip to cut the other end free.

Then I pull the thread completely out leaving a ‘guide’ of where to cut

After I cut all my pieces I sewed a long zig zag stitch across all the ends so it wouldn’t unravel in the wash.

I washed and dried it on delicate. Took it outside and gave it a good shake (first time I’ve been glad it was windy outside, lol)
Next it was time it iron out this mess!

I set my iron on high and had lots of water for steam and spray. Turned on Netflix and got to work! lol
(All irons are different so test a corner until you have the right heat.)

Now that that’s over it’s finally time to sew my curtains!!
decided to do ribbon tabs, this was so easy and I love how they look hanging. I folded over an inch on the top ironed it (burlap keeps folds wonderfully so I don’t even bother to pin it) folded it over again 5″ and ironed it. Next I cut a bunch of 5″ strips of ribbon (I just 3/8″ satin, so that’s what I used. On my next set I make I think I’ll try wider ribbon) I heat sealed the ends of the ribbon and placed them about 5″ apart. These I did pin in place.

When I sewed then I just lined them up with the side of my foot.

This worked out great, I back stitched over the ribbons to give them extra support. I hung them up marked where the reached the floor, took the down and hemmed them. Just like the top, minus the ribbon.

Next I cut the burlap for my ruffles. When I cut my panels I cut 2 extras that I planned to use for my ruffles. I did my strips 4″ wide, sewed 2 together (I only did my ruffles twice the length of my panels so they weren’t to ruffle-y, as if there’s such a thing!), and did a zig zag stitch down each edge to keep them from coming apart. (If I had thought it through more I would have just cut 1 panel twice the length of my panels so I didn’t have to sew 2 together. Things are always so much simpler in hindsight, right..lol)

Strips all cut out, My Matt said they’re beautiful, I love that kid!!

Ironing my pleats. I spaced them a bit apart since I only did twice the length of the panels.

After I got my pleats all ironed I placed them on my curtains and pined them in place (I didn’t bother to baste stitch my pleats)

All done!!!!!

I couldn’t be happier with how they turned out! This picture just doesn’t do them justice, if only our eyes could take pictures!!!

I also diy-ed my fancy bay window rod!! It was so simple and cheap (right up alley!)
1) My rod is a 1/2″ 10′ conduit pipe, I got it at lowes for $1.68 I think (I had it from a previous teepee birthday project)
2) I looked at walmart but I couldn’t fint rod hangers big enough to hold my rod. (They only had them with the rods) but I found some large hooks in this pack for about $1.50.
3) Good spray paint.

Lucky for me my hot construction Husband has so many tools, I bent my pipe with a pipe bender (I used the floor under my window as a guide) I just kept bending till it looked good.
I found some fancy curtain rod ends….Christmas balls that I cut the hanging thing off of!! Lol told you it was cheap!!

I took all my pieces outside spray painted them, screwed in my hooks, hung up my curtains and DONE!!! 🙂

Before I painted the rod.

Love it!!!

Altogether I spent around $50 for custom curtains and rod, not to bad:)

Did I mention how much I love them??!?!!