Dining Room Progress And New, Updated Drapery Fabric

I finally feel like I have a vision for the dining room, and I have all of the details worked out. So after a week of feeling stifled and uninspired, I finally felt anxious to get started yesterday. I didn’t get a whole lot done because, as I took the shelves and TV off of the wall, they left a lot of damage on the wall. So I had to spend time repairing the damage.

I’ll have to continue with that today. I still need to get the long shelf down and then fill in all of those holes and the (minor) damage done by the caulk that I used between the shelves and the wall. But the main damage actually came from the TV. I had hung the TV with a simple TV wall hanger, but somewhere along the way, the hanger that attached to the TV got bent and wouldn’t come off of the hanger section on the wall. So I ended up having to pull the TV off the wall, along with the hanger and the wall anchors that held it in place. That left two rather large holes in the wall, so I had to fill those in with quite a bit of spackle.

I had actually hoped to get some paint samples selected and get those on the wall yesterday, but in the end, I ran out of time after dealing with the wall damage.

But I also got a little sidetracked because the new fabric was delivered yesterday! If you’ll remember, I had ordered a sample of the fabric, but I thought the colors were a bit washed out. So I edited the colors and then ordered my fabric. I ordered all of the yardage that I need with the edited colors without ordering a sample first, so I was quite anxious to see how it turned out. When I initially opened the package, I didn’t see much of a difference. But then when I draped the fabric over the curtain rod, I could definitely tell a difference.

I also ordered a different fabric this time. The first time, when I ordered the one-yard sample, I had it printed on the Essex Linen from Spoonflower. But this time, when I ordered the full yardage, I ordered the extra-wide 3.5-ounce cotton sateen. I think that made a big difference, too. The print seems so much sharper on the cotton sateen.

So the slightly darker colors with more contrast plus the cotton sateen really did make a big difference in the final print. Here’s a comparison of the bird on the original sample fabric on the right and the new darker/sharper print on the cotton sateen on the left.

I can really see a difference in the biggest pink flower on the print. It’s not a huge difference, but it’s enough. The new print on the cotton sateen looks bolder, has more contrast, and also looks sharper.

So while I took a chance with ordering the full yardage that I need without first ordering a sample of the fabric with the updated colors, I’m very pleased with the fabric. Of course, it looks horrible with the current rug. 😀 But I’m keeping the rug in place for a while longer because it’s protecting the floor for now.

The reason I bought a different fabric this time is because I wanted double-width curtains on these windows this time, and I thought it would be easier to just use double-width fabric instead of having to sew two widths of fabric together and match patterns. So this saved me a step and a lot of time.

So hopefully today I can get the rest of the wall repaired and get some paint samples on the wall. That’s the goal, at least. We’ll see how far I get. I know I’ll have one more distraction today because the clay for my chandelier is out for delivery today, so I can’t promise that I’ll stay focused on the walls and paint color. 😀