Using a curtain to make storage space

Pay no attention to the boxes behind the curtain.

We welcomed our first houseguests this weekend, which served as the perfect impetus to tackle some of the bigger projects on our “eventually we’ll get this done” list.

Namely, we needed to get the third floor guest room in order. Or at least get it set up well enough that guests could stay there.

We’d always planned to make the third floor a guest room, as the house was marketed as a three-bedroom home. (We’re using one as the office and the finished third floor is the third.) But upstairs was full of boxes of stuff, and some supplies leftover from my chevron curtain project.

When Aaron’s sister made plans to come visit with her daughter from Wisconsin, we needed to get in gear so they’d have a place to stay.

So we upgraded our bed and moved the old bed up to the third floor. Acquiring a bed is a pretty good first step.

See what I mean about our wonky ceiling? The left side of the roof pitch narrows down to less than two feed above the floor. What am I supposed to do with that space?!

Next, we had to work around one of the quirks of this house. The third floor ceiling is slanted with the roof pitch. And one wall gets really, really short, to the point that the “ceiling” meets the wall about a foot and a half above the floor. So there’s a ton of space that a person can’t functually use.

But I still have boxes that need to be stored upstairs.

So in a stroke of brilliance, I decided to hang a curtain midway up the ceiling to create a faux wall and hide the boxes nestled in under the short ceiling. And then I used that as a backdrop for the bed, as well, so the areas where our guests would move around the most would have the tallest ceiling.

I found a long, long curtain rod at Ikea for about $5, plus a couple of brackets for about $2-3 each. A little bit of labor for Aaron, and the rod was hung.

I actually had the most trouble with finding fabric to fill the space. It’s about 9 feet wide, and I needed it to be almost 5 feet tall to hang from the rod to the floor. My instinct was to buy three yards of fabric and hang it horizontally. But most fabric bolts are only 40-44 inches wide, which wouldn’t be tall enough if I hung it on its side. And I didn’t like any of the fabrics I could find in a larger width.

Although it wasn’t the original plan to use three separate pieces of fabric for the backdrop curtain, I really like the way this ended up looking. Barley likes it, too.

So I opted to use three panels of the regular width fabric and hang each from the rod vertically. It worked out better, I think, because I can pull apart the panels to get to the boxes between them instead of getting in from one side or the other.

It also looks prettier than having one solid color or pattern the whole way across.

I’m very happy with how it turned out. It got a great reaction from our guests, too!

Making space for new stuff

It was a rare night when Aaron and I got home from work at approximately the same time.

Look at all that pretty, cubical storage space. Plus I’ve got great light and a view. Perfection.

He works the day shift, and I generally work the night shift, so we don’t really get to see each other often. Factor in our energy levels when we do get home, plus dealing with dinner, and it’s rare for us to manage to be productive in our home on those nights when our schedules collide mid-week.

So imagine my surprise when we actually got stuff done on Tuesday night.

Granted, I got takeout for dinner. But we watched the debate between candidates for the 95th state House district, ran some laundry, and — most notably — rearranged the office to accommodate my new Ikea shelf-desk.

New office set-up. The corner desk on the left used to be basically oriented where the new Ikea desk-shelf now sits. Previously, the room was mostly storage.

It was quite the feat. Just look at these photos of the office clutter, air-lifted to the hallway and, strangely and not by my doing, the bathtub.

Christmas crafting: DIY ornament, card holder, mantel hanger

I told Aaron that for our first holiday season at the house, I wanted it to look like Christmas threw up here.

I meant that in the prettiest way possible.

We don’t have a tree yet, but I’m working hard on decorating the rest of the house. It’s not that hard: The walls are already bright green, so adding a dash of red and some sparkle is really all it takes.

I’ve spent some time on Pinterest the past few days (haven’t we all?) ogling all the pretty Christmas things and finding some inspiration for our decorations.

And I’m trying to do some frugal DIYing to try to cut down on the costs. It’s taking more time, obviously, than if I just raided the holiday section of Target, but as I mentioned a couple days ago, it feels really good to get crafty. Here are a couple of projects and plans I have jingling around in my head, along with about how much each costs to make.

My not-quite-finished thumbtack ornament. I dig the way it looks sort of pinecone-y.

Thumbtack ornament, about $3: This one was a straight-from-Pinterest project, although I didn’t pin it and a quick trip to Google shows that it’s been around for quite some time.

I bought a pack of 150 thumbtacks for $1.99, realizing I might have overpaid a smidge but did it anyway because I was getting cranky from overshopping. I also got a package of six 2.5-inch diameter styrofoam balls, which cost $4.99.

Confession: I didn’t read any instructions, just looked at the photo that was pinned. But I predicted that the tacks might fall out of the styrofoam. So I opted to use hot glue to make the tacks a bit more secure.

I built in a hanger so I can put the ornament on our tree, or hang it somewhere else in the house.

I picked a spot to start and put in a six-tack circle with a space in the center. Then I wrapped a piece of thin metallic string (which came with another pack of ornaments) around another tack and glued it into the center for a built-in hanger for the ornament. In retrospect, I could have done that for the last tack, instead. Or really any of the ones in between.

Once the top was set, I worked in a circle fanning the tacks out. I ran out of tacks with just a few rows left, so I’ll need to pick up some more. I might do another ornament like this, because I like the way it’s turning out, and it’s a cheap way to bring a lot of shiny metallics into the picture.

Take home point, though: 150 tacks would be enough for probably a 2-inch ball. For a 2.5-incher, I’m guessing it’ll take almost 200 tacks.