Teach Me Tuesday: Low Cost Window Treatments

If you would like to be featured in an upcoming edition of Teach Me Tuesday, please email me at LivingWithLindsay@gmail.com and we’ll chat!

This week’s edition of Teach Me Tuesday comes from Christy at Embellished Bayou. Christy has a sweet Etsy store where she sells custom made home decor and gifts. She also runs a fun blog featuring her thrifty finds and projects. Y’all, she even made her own mirrored nightstand. I’m totally going to use her tips when I start working on mine.

Recently, Christy showed us how to create inexpensive window treatments. Her outside-of-the-box thinking really caught my eye, and I figured it would catch yours, too.

Christy explains:

We’ve lived in our current home for three and half years and just last week I finally got around to finding window treatments for the last two bare windows. This large window in the front of the house has nice wide blinds so my goal was for a more decorative treatment rather than one to provide privacy. Here’s what it looked like before:

And now after:

It’s amazing how something so simple can make the room more complete and cozy! I had actually tried to find fabric to make a valance last year but could never find anything just right. Then just recently it finally occurred to me that simple brown faux silk panels were the way to go. I was able to get these 96” panels at JCPenney for $60 for the pair. Instead of doing one long rod, I used the shortest rods I could find, one on each side of the window. I found the rods at Lowe’s for about $9 each. Hubby actually cut a few inches off of each one to make them even shorter.

I left the length long and they’re pooling at the bottom, I’m still undecided on this:

The next window I tackled was the one in our office/my craft room. Here’s what it looked like before:

We just recently got new vinyl windows in all our bedrooms, and I wanted to show them off, plus the mini blinds were really getting on my nerves. Since this window looks out into our backyard, I have no problem keeping it uncovered, so I decided a valance would be the best solution. I had an unused bed skirt made out of the same tiger fabric that the chairs are upholstered with, so I re-purposed it and made a valance. Of course I couldn’t find a black tension rod so I had to buy a white one and spray paint it black.

Now I have a beautiful unobstructed view into the backyard and lots of natural light for my crafting!

I absolutely LOVE that bedskirt turned valence. What an ingenious idea! I also think the panels in your dining room are stunning. Before, your armchairs were lost in that window. Now, they really stand out.

Thanks for sharing these great ideas with us, Christy! Everyone needs to head over to Embellished Bayou to see what else you have up your sleeve.