There are two specific costly things that seem to get glossed over when building a house–gutters and window treatments. The thought, let alone the cost, didn’t fully cross our minds until we were a few days away from moving into the house.

The gutters got priority voting and after the rotten winter we’ve had I’m very glad we didn’t wait. The window treatments however were of little importance to us especially after our fab neighbor Eydie clued us into the inexpensive room darkening $5 blinds at Home Depot. We scooped those puppies up in august and they fared just fine. Minus the tedious nature of putting them up each day (8 of them), they looked and worked perfectly. Plus the estimates we were getting ranged from $3000-$6000+ for what we invested $40 in with the paper blinds. Oy!

In January we finally decided to be become adults and invest in real window treatments but still didn’t want to pay the obnoxious cost. Enter our neighbor from the Twins Court ‘hood, who as an interior designer, was able offer expert input and helped us out with finding a great product for a fraction of the cost. We went simple white, up/down cordless blinds and are satisfied with the result.

The real issue was what to do with the kitchen. Our backyard view is fabulous and you don’t see anything but yard and trees. We all agreed to not get blinds for either set of windows but knew we needed something for the side window where we can see the houses on the hill to the left. We thought we’d carry through on the burlap look on the lights in the gathering room and counter chairs but Benji found fantastic gray/off white Chevron curtains at West Elm. We ordered four panels for each of the kitchen windows and… They. Are. Perfect.

In the end, while we were apprehensive to put anything on the windows given how pretty they look on their own (and the cost), we knew were a necessary evil.

Now, when needed and wherever we are in the house, we can have a curtain call anytime we want.

I’d say that deserves an encore.