Sunday, December 4, 2011

curtains to dye for

Lately I've been feeling like our white Ikea curtains aren't living up to their full potential against the white walls.


It's just so much...white!


Since we can't paint the walls here (rental), I had the idea to go the other route and try dying the curtains instead. I thought they would look great dyed a very light shade of gray. My goal was to help them stand out from the walls, without changing the overall look too drastically.

While I was at Michael's this weekend picking up some party supplies (more on that later!), I grabbed two boxes of Rit dye in Pearl Gray. It was the only shade of gray available, so I just took the plunge and hoped for the best.


I read all the directions on the box, then got ready to dye (no pun intended). First, I mixed one box of dye with two cups of hot water. Then I started filling up the washing machine with hot water. When it was just about full, I poured in the dye mixture.


Next, I added a cup of salt.


And here's a picture of me saying "Tony, you're not getting me in this shot are you?? I'm wearing a grungy hoodie!"


And last but not least, I dropped the curtains into the water. (They were pre-soaked in hot water to keep them from soaking up the dye in uneven blotches.)


About 20 minutes later I checked on the progress. The curtains looked...not much different. The dingy gray-white color reminded me of the "before" sock in those Clorox commercials.


Boo. Luckily, I had reserves. I repeated the whole process with the second box of dye. Good thing I bought two! Then I watched a little Sunday night football with Tony and Chloe while I waited with baited breath. (My fantasy football team is kicking butt, by the way!!) We tried to teach Chloe the heisman pose.


About a half hour later, I threw the curtains in the dryer and hung them back up. They turned out great!


I love how the shade of gray is just a subtle change from the white, but they really pop against the walls now. The change is a little hard to see in these photos, but I promise they look great in real life!


Yay for ideas that work!

In other news, while Tony was surfing at Westport on Saturday, Chloe and I took the opportunity to go out and buy his birthday and Christmas presents. (His b-day is not until Dec. 10, but Chloe won't be here that day so we wanted to celebrate early.) Chloe really wanted to throw her dad a surprise party, so we stocked up on streamers, balloons, party hats and the works. Chloe was so excited that she wore her party get-up almost a full hour before Tony even got home!


She also got all of our "party guests" ready. Can you find the human?


She also practiced her big "surprise!"


Finally, the birthday boy made it home. He loved his surprise!





Happy early birthday to Tony! And hooray for gray curtains!







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