You've Got a Blogger Friend in Me! And a Curtain Project!

OK, all you mom's are now probably singing the Toy Story theme song, "You've Got a Friend in Me"... it's a catchy one.  And it was the perfect title for today's post.  Why???

Well, because yesterday I was able to do a "blogger meet up" with Amanda from Our Humble A{Bowe}d.  If you have been reading for awhile now, you will know that Amanda and I had done this once before... and it was VERY successful, so of course we couldn't wait to do it again! 

That's right, Amanda and I DID meet through the blog world.  And she has also created some great custom art pieces and stationary for me as well.  Have I mentioned she has talent?  Like none I have personally seen before!  We really hit it off the first time we were together.  We were like peas and carrots.  And laughed like long time friends.

So when Amanda let me know that she was taking another road trip back to my area to stay with her family, we HAD to make sure to take a minute to meet up.  So we did.

We revisted Ikea so she could snag up a couple of things for a project or two, I will let her spill those beans.  We weren't there too long, and spent the whole time catching up and gabbing that I didn't take one single photo.  And don't get me wrong, the showroom is always chock full of inspiration, but miss gabby pants {a.k.a. me}, totally dropped the ball....

Anywho... Amanda and I returned to my happy home after finishing up at Ikea...

Wait a minute, do you recognize those faces?

Other than the fact I look completely creepy in this photo, I had to post it, because we had a good laugh that my photo stylist husband, thought of the genius photo idea.  Yes, Amanda and I both had our mugs in the pages of this very magazine...  Too much fun!

But what should two DIY crafty bloggers do when getting together?  Sure, chatting and taking silly pictures is fun, but it's even more fun when there are projects involved right?  That's what we thought too!

And because Amanda is so great with a sewing machine {have you seen her pillow covers?}, I thought maybe she would be good with some hem tape too?  Wow, was I right.  We {she} got right to work on making some lovely new curtains for our kitchen space.  I gave her moral support and snapped pictures...  and she didn't even need the moral support so... yeah....

First, let's look at the ugly window before shall we?  I wasn't very good at taking pictures directly into a window, so please forgive the awful quality:

I decided that I wanted something brighter and fresher and to nix the red roman shade since at this point, it was the only red remaining in the kitchen after we began to inject teals and blues into the space instead.  I chose this fabric for the new curtains:

Amanda started out by doing lots and lots of measuring....

And marking:

Did you know you could use pencil on fabric.  I didn't.  That's why she was here.

Then, we got out my trusted tape {found at a fabric store}:

And used it to hem all four sides of each new panel:

Here is where her smarts came into play again.  You see, I like to make things harder than they need to be.  So I would have tried to measure out each panel and hope they end up the same size.  Not Amanda.  She popped the panels on top of on another and lined them up to ensure the final bottom hems were exactly the same:

Worked like a charm.  Because they ended up being the same exact size and length.  Love.

Ready for the still awful photography yet great results After picture?

The colors are SO soothing and pretty and I love that the curtains now frame out the window to add so much softness to the space!

And when it came to hanging them, I just found a cheapy curtain rod from Target for a couple of bucks, and added some rings with clips:

I really love rings with clips.  So great!

OK, so the final before and after, bad photography included:

It's pretty amazing what small changes can make in a space.  It felt like a whole new world room.  And it almost made me not look at the counter tops that I am itching to accidentally destroy so that they have to be replaced... not that I would do that...

Thanks again Amanda for such a fantastic day.  So glad we found one another.  And I absolutely can't wait to meet up again!

Anyone else meeting new friends via blog land?  Oh, and no worries, I was safe when meeting a complete stranger I met online.  Sure, at first I worried she might be a 67 year old man with a foot fetish, but I had been reading her blog for months, so if that was the case, then he was REALLY amazing at secret lifestyle blogging and worth meeting anyway...  Who else loves the powers of hem tape?  Anyone have any photography tips for taking pictures of bright windows?