Dress Up Your Child’s Windows

I am often asked how to handle window treatments in the nursery or child’s bedroom. Parents of young children are often concerned with light leaking into the room, which might keep their baby awake. Every parent wants their child to sleep through the night and not wake up at the first light of dawn. While some kids are just better sleepers than others, window shades, blinds or other coverings just might help keep your little one on a schedule.

During waking hours, letting a lot of light into the nursery creates a happy vibe in the room, while using blackout shades for nap time is the perfect way to create the darkness needed for sleep. If you decide to use a lightweight fabric like linen or voile for your curtains, simply mount a blackout shade into the window frame.

image from Traditional Home

Using drapes with blackout sewn into the panels, as seen below, allows very little light to penetrate the room during the day. Using blackouts behind your patterned curtains also allows you to better see the pattern of the fabric in a sunlit window.

image from the former dominomag.com

Roman shades are decorative and fun. Again, lining them with blackout makes all the difference in separating night from day. Below, they added another sheer panel to diffuse the light during the day.

Have fun with window treatments with cornice box details in a notched pattern or other geometric shapes. The use of a cornice box helps frame the window nicely and combined with curtain panels, can make a real statement in the room. I also love a stripe for window treatments. Stripes help create height in a room, and they add pattern with some neutrality.

image from the former dominomag.com, roman shade by Mod Green Pod

Whatever your choice, whether it be shades, curtains or blinds, use your windows as an opportunity to add dimension and decor to the  room.