One of the things that I truly love about my house is its windows. In the living room, I have five large windows across the back of the house. When I gaze out them, especially in the summer, it feels as if we are out in the country. I have thick trees across the top and the fence is obscured in honeysuckle and trumpet vines. With the slope at the back of the yard, from my chair in the living room, I can gaze upon the treetops. I also love my trees. I have a decent size magnolia, which was a surprise as they aren't usually seen here, and when they are, they are usually very small. Just off of my back porch, I have a giant crape myrtle. It is so big, that it towers over the roof and when you are in the front yard, it can be seen. When it is in full bloom and the wind blows, it litters the back yard with its delicate petal snow.
With such a view, I have always shied away from covering my windows. I keep saying that when we finally paint over the odd turquoise blue and choose some new furniture, I will make some nice roman blinds for my windows. Since this is still quite some time away, I have always had some guilt over the electric bill in the summer and heating in the winter. The windows are original to the house, and the early fifties didn't produce the energy efficiency that is available now. So, I came to the conclusion that I should go ahead and cover them.
I spent a few days trying to decide my plan of attack. Hoot is very much a curtain destroyer. Since he was old enough to stand, he has pulled down curtains around the house. He easily bends normal curtain rods until they snap, or wither enough to reward him with the prize. In the bedrooms, I have given over to using metal straps, like they use to hold conduit to walls, on the curtain rods. But, I don't want to go that route in the living room. At the same time, I wanted to keep it below $10 a window since this isn't a long term solution. I decided to make light colored curtains that would easily come down if Hoot was to pull them. I spent just under $3.50 for some simple rods on sale. Then, after cruising fabric departments at several places, I found myself looking at twin sheets. Walmart had their cheap twin sheets for $3 each. The dimensions of the sheets would easily allow me to split each sheet into two curtains, so I would only need one sheet per window. So, I spent $7.50 for each living room window.
I hung a rod, and stood back to try and picture what I wanted, hoping to plan out my attack on the energy bill. To help me out, I slung a sheet over the rod and pulled the back down so that it was doubled. As if by magic, Hoot immediately came over and pulled the sheet off of the rod. Ha! The rod stayed and the little angel came away with nothing more than the sheet! I figured this was a good starting place and that I could cover all the windows as such until Hoot gave up trying to uncover the windows every time I turned my back.
So, I hung the three rods that I could easily get to and covered the windows. I put off two windows until this week when I would have some time to move furniture and vacuum up any dust elk that might be lurking. Then, I remembered I still had two tension rods tucked away and put them up with my curtains. So, voila, my windows were covered and my beautiful trees were gone. Oh, it was sad, I miss my view something fierce. The living room is darker and sadder. But, the next day, I was folding clothes when I realized the air conditioning shut off. My immediate impulse was one of horror! It was almost noon, and usually the a/c runs non-stop for most of the day in the summer. But, when I checked it, I learned that the curtains had done their job. The a/c wasn't broken, it just shut itself off for a bit. Hm, maybe I can learn to live with this new taupe view after all.
Now, I just need to put up the rest of the permanent rods in the living room and tackle my dining room windows. Those shouldn't be too bad as they are short and mostly covered with shade from our big trees out front. I will drag out the sewing machine for those curtains as the windows are visible from the street. Really, I already feel redneck enough with the curtains that no one can see being sheets, I would hate to pull into the driveway and be greeted with the like from the front of the house.
Overheard in the bookstore:
Did you know Susie is on vacation?
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