The roller shades in the playroom are really falling apart:

Yes, they have been patched with packing tape.  Geez, they’ve been used for the past 4 years on a daily basis going up in the morning, down at quiet time, up after quiet time, down at night…so that’s  about 2,928 windings/unwindings.  They are worn, they are torn, they’ve been taped, but the mechanics are still working perfectly- and I think I only paid about $15 per shade!

I prefer the roller shades over cellular blinds or curtains because, well, it’s a playroom with lots of kiddos, lots of hands, lots of faces, lots of touching.  I need something that can be replaced inexpensively, easy to clean, and something that blocks out all the outside light for quiet time.

I’d been toying with replacing these with grass shades or some sort of textured material in a roman-shade type style, something natural and earthy.  But the more I pinterest playrooms and daycare spaces, the more I realize I like color- and design- and cleanliness- and color.  Do you get that I like color?

I ran across this:

And I was WOW’D!  First off- I love the decorative roller shades!  Secondly, it goes along with that previous post about color in playrooms- how your base color should be neutral- like gray or beige.  See how well that works here?  Love it!

I WANT those roller shades.  OK, maybe not those exact same roller shades, but I betcha I can DIY my own version of this!

First off, I needed to find a piece of fabric that I liked.  Enter this- a flat sheet from Fred Meyer:

Using 2011 lingo: My first attempt- epic fail.

I didn’t launder the sheet first, didn’t iron it, I just cut it to size and taped it to the existing roller shade:

Seemed like a good plan to me, until I realized the backside would be visible when the shade was rolled up:

And it was lumpy and bumpy and saggy and the roller shade wouldn’t roll up.

Scratch that plan.

I sat on the project for 4 more weeks…..

Until tonight.  I decided to do it “the right way”.

I bought some spray adhesive.

I laundered the sheet and then ironed it.

I covered the playroom table with newspaper and unrolled the roller shade out onto the table.

I cut the fabric just slightly wider than the shade.

Then I sprayed a section with adhesive- only spraying about a foot at a time- so it would be manageable and super tacky.

I carefully smoothed it out and made sure to go a little higher than I needed to so this ugly edge would never be seen:

I then trimmed the sides as flush as I could:

Here’s the finished result:

Adds that little bit of “pop” that I was looking for!