Lining curtains

keatergreyhound · 10 July 2005 at 12:46PM

My daugher of 9 months has started to wake up during the night. At 1st we coulsnt understand what was wrong with her. Now weve worked out its when the sun comes out and she thinks its time to get up. Her curtains are unlined so im going to need to line them myself. Ive no sewing machine and am a beginner to say the least. So its going to be done by hand. There tab topped curtains. Can anyone please give me any pointers? At the moment she has a sheet up at her window. But at least ive slept. What fabric do I need to buy?

BWZN93 · 10 July 2005 at 1:08PM

Hi

In our rented house the landlord put up some shoddy IKEA blinds that were pretty useless at anything, so I went and bought some 'blackout' material from the fabic store, and hand sewed it onto the back, so that they still worked. Its a white thick heavy material that has some kind of lining on it, so no light comes through at all unless there is a hole in it. I think it was around £5 per meter, and I just sewed it using white thread and a normal needle.

Needless to say, it works, it is really good stuff. If it were me, id just buy some blackout material and stitch it to the top edge and around the sides. it will probably take time if the curtains are big (I suppose you would only need to sew on enough to cover the window completely) but it only took me a couple of hours to hand stitch the material on to two blinds.

Good luck!

Jo xx

Ticklemouse · 10 July 2005 at 3:25PM

Tab top curtains are always going to let in light. Get yourself a proper blackout blind - they work far better. At my last house, when DS1 was little, we had a blind as well as lined curtains. At this house he now has our old bedroom curtains that had blackout linings sewn into them. The downside to blackout lining is that it is very bulky and it can make your curtains hang funny.

I have just bought a blackout blind for DS2's room as he won't go to sleep until 9pm - I pick it up tomorrow. I will pay £49 (I think) and have a 71 inch blind. It is the better of the 2 qualities offered. Yu can get them in various colours. I'm told that it is better to fit the blind on the outside of the window recess but I can't do that so it's having to go inside. Also, as 71 inches was the largest ready made, I wouldn't have got one to fit.

I bought the blind from a curtain stall on a local market - never found any big enough at the right price anywhere else.