We have been waiting for a nice weekend to get out into the garage to work on our playroom board and batten and it has been TORTURE for me.

I like to get projects DONE. Our weekends have been pretty full with a variety of other home projects though so the board and batten has been moving slowly. Then throw quarantine in there and it has really thrown me for a loop!

Needless to say, I am working on many other projects. Every few days I have something new going on which is SO FUN for me.

The latest, is a patio update. I knew I wanted some curtains for the back patio but I wasn’t sure what I wanted. I have seen ample pins and posts about the DIY drop cloth curtains so I started down that route.

In Dallas, my mom has done drop cloth curtains so I reached out to her and asked her thoughts. She was hesitant. I realized quickly:

I did NOT want paint drop cloth curtains.

Why, you ask? One word: mold.

Ew. No thank you. If you have read some of my other posts, you know my nasty experiences with mold here in Texas.

Here are some pros and cons of drop cloth curtains:

Pros

• • Space darkening
  • Well Priced
  • DIY Project!
  • Privacy
  • Maintains area temperature well

Cons

• • DIY Project (depends on who you ask here)
  • Heavy
  • Limited Color
  • Lemme say it again: MOLD.

If you live in a dry state like Colorado, you won’t need to worry too much about mold. Drop cloth curtains could be a GREAT choice for you. In the Texas humidity, you need to worry about it. Often.

Back to the point though…

I decided to do whimsical sheer white curtains.

Lemme tell you something.

These curtains make me want to get married again! Y’all think I am crazy, I’m sure of it. But something about these flowy romantic white curtains are just

SWOONWORTHY.

Pair them with café string lights and I’m done. Gimme a glass of wine and a book and you won’t hear a peep from me all weekend.

I started comparing prices on regular curtains and found sheer, extra long 120″ white curtains through Wayfair for $8 a curtain!

I did DIY the curtain rods. Instead of spending a fortune on heavy duty extra long curtain rods, I ran to Home Depot for my some DIY supplies.

Tools you need to DIY your own curtain rods

• • Screw Eyes LARGE
  • 3/4 inch steel conduit
  • Multipurpose Pipe Cutter
  • Spray Paint
  • Hooks Medium

To DIY your curtain rods:

• • Spray paint the conduit
  • Measure wall to wall to get the necessary length of the conduit. I measured and subtracted 2 inches (one inch for each side)
  • Cut the conduit with a pipe cutter
  • Measure where you wanted my hooks to sit (I did 12 inches but wished I did them closer like 4 inches)
  • Pre-drill a hole where your screw eyes and hooks will sit
  • Screw in hook and eye

Easy Right?

Except I learned that I need to think these things through ahead of time…

Although it ended up working out, when I bought my supplies, I didn’t buy any hooks. I ONLY bought eyes.

I realized that I can’t have two eyes (a closed hook) because there would be no way to get the conduit through.

DUH. Why didn’t I think of that before my husband said something?

Glad I have him around!

What we did to work around that err instead of going to the store was to simply cut one eye to make it a hook. To prevent this, simply buy safety cup hooks AND eyes.

THIS IS A  SAFETY CUP HOOK:

THIS IS AN EYE:

If you buy all hooks, there is a chance of the wind picking up and ripping your whole curtain rod down. This will happen.

My curtains already FLY in the wind. I have had no issues with the rod or the curtain flying off because of the screw eyes.

I am still working on a few remaining decor pieces on our back patio before showing y’all the whole thing!

Here are some pretty sneak peeks of what I have going on after installing the curtains!

To see the rest of the back patio summer reveal

CLICK HERE!