New valance for my studio ~ Crayon Box Quilt Studio

After painting my studio a pale shade of Yellow right before I brought Penelope my longarm home I needed to put up some curtains so I used the old white sheers with embroidered edge detail that used to hang in our master bedroom at our old house. They worked because the studio window is double wide and couldn't be used in our current master bedroom since we have 4 windows there now.

Here you can see the pretty edge detail a little bit better (sort of) along with my flying frog made of Jackfruit wood that is a good luck symbol in Bali and the other bits of fun I have hanging in the window.

But lately seeing them I've been itching for a change up plus the long panel in the center keeps getting in my way when stitching together big pieces. I didn't want to spend a lot of money so I considered what I already had in my stash and came upon the Bonjour Mon Ami by Amanda Murphy FQ bundle that I had purchased from The Intrepid Thread.

The pale Yellow goes well with the wall color and the rest of the pallet works well with the other colors in the room without being too wild. I hunted on the internet for ideas and finally came across one that was not just a bunch of squares sewn together and that suited my style a better. Luckily I was able to hunt down the tad bit more that I needed to make my plan work (at $3.99 a yard too) and as soon as it arrived, I set to work.

I cut each of the fat quarters into 3" x 21" strips.

Then I put them together in a pleasing layout. The belly bar of my longarm frame really is great for this.

Then it was just a bit of really quick stitching together of the strips to do.

Pairs of two became sets of eight and before long they were all sewn together.

All told, it took me 1 1/4 hours last Saturday evening to get to this point. It was late and I was tired so I called it a day.

Now when I walk into the room, this is what I see. Sooooo much prettier!

The 2nd additional fabric that I ordered didn't arrive so I had to make due with the 1 yard of the red print that I received. I added a 3" strip across the top and the bottom, hemmed both sides and the bottom and then sewed a curtain rod pocket at the top.

I'm really happy with the way this turned out though if that other fabric had come home too, I would have had more of the red available and would have made the top border wider. Oh well, I still like it as is.

It adds just the right amount of color and is sheer enough to still let the brilliant sunshine still come through.

I've been contemplating what curtains I want to put up in our dining room. After making this one, I just might make some for there too instead of purchasing premade ones. The hunt for just the right fabric just commenced!

Oh, and I think I'll link up to a few parties today. Check them out. There is bound to be lots of great quilt eye candy to see.