A Great Idea For Your Christmas Mantel

With a new home there are some new and exciting ways I can decorate.

 I am finding that it is a little harder for me to come up with ideas this year. I attribute it to not being that familiar with my new home. Once I came up with a design plan I felt more comfortable moving forward.

In our previous home we had an unusually large mantel to decorate every year. Our mantel spanned the entire width of the room. It was 17ft long. Our new mantel is about a third of that, measuring 65in.

Since our new home’s family room is smaller with a smaller mantel I won’t be doing anything quite as elaborate as I did in our previous home.

The fireplace and the TV share the same wall so this is also something I have to keep in mind because visually your eye will be taking them in at the same time they need to marry well together.

This picture shows how they are connected, it was taken the day we moved in. The TV now resides on the wall and I have artwork over the mantel.

My inspiration picture for my mantel is elegant and simple……

As with all inspiration images I will do my own interpretation  of this beautiful image. I would love to have the large urns, but I don’t! 

Always remember you can tweak things and make it your own. When I look at images of rooms I always look with an open mind and I  never, ever think, “ I can never do that because I will never have those beautiful pieces or that beautiful home!” That is a defeatist attitude. 

Instead I look at it thinking about the colors, the textures, the composition and then I change it up to work with what I have and with my own home and most importantly within my own budget constraints. 

My tip for you is simple…….

Study good design, and what you love, and try to apply it to your room within your own environment, and within your own budget!!

GREAT IDEA:

Since our home is new I want to make sure I protect our mantel from any damage from the greenery I will be using. I use a faux pine greenery for my mantel and I also will add some live greenery that I can remove when it gets dry and somewhat dead looking. By combining the two I get the scent of the pine and it also makes the faux greenery look more real.

The faux greenery has wires that can damage the finish on my mantel so when I read about this next idea I pinned it so I could show my husband, and I want to share this with you because I think it is such a great idea.

via

A mantel nailing board. You take a 3/4in. piece of plywood the same size as your mantel. Add felt furniture glides under the board so it won’t scratch your mantel and this will be where you attach your greenery, stockings, etc. After Christmas is over you can store it with the garland still attached, if you have room or remove the garland and store the board. When Christmas rolls around next year, you are all set!

Today is Christmas mantel day at our home. My handy hubby will be cutting the piece of wood to fit our mantel and I will begin my decorating for this year. Our mantel is 8 in. deep and we found a board at Lowes that is  8in. deep and primed white so that will save us another step of having to paint the whole board.

I will show you the final results in an upcoming post, I promise!

Yesterday we did a fun, easy project.

Here is my inspiration picture for that project…….

Here is a picture of my hubby helping create the look I am going for…..

He is a very handy guy, plus he has patience and understands when I say, “ Move it just a smidge!” he knows just how far a smidge is!

Once I take some pictures of the final results I will do a blog post to show you the results. I am delighted in how it turned out. Simple and elegant!!!

I hope you are enjoying decking your halls as much as I am!!!!

Remember To Always…….

   

 

 

Bright Green Is In My Christmas Color Scheme!!

 

Decorating for Christmas this year is so fun for me since it is the first Christmas in our new home.

Since I am just getting acquainted with our new home it took me awhile to come up with a color scheme and overall design plan.

Once I looked at the inspiration images I had pinned the overall design became more clear to me…..

Yesterday was a fun day of decorating the Christmas tree and wrapping a few gifts. 

This year I went to Spoonflower to purchase my main patterned papers. The quality of the paper and the clarity of colors is wonderful. 

I highly recommend getting paper from them. It might be more than you pay at the big box stores, but it can make just the right statement and set the whole mood for your Christmas decor.

When I choose my color scheme I look for papers and ribbons that will tie the overall look together. Remember those presents under the tree are part of the total look.

This is my original collage of wrapping papers. I did not get the plaid, but in looking at it again, I just might have to order it too.



The malachite wrapping paper ties in nicely with the bright green malachite pillow I am using as my base pillow this year.

I am using my woodland creature pillow from last years Christmas décor. It is one of my all time favorites and just seems to work in our home.

It’s fun to see it all coming together. Of course there are some twist and turns along the way. 

Sometimes the design process takes on a life of it’s own. One of the many things I love about the process.

For instance. I was not going to put bows on my tree this year, however once I was done I realized I needed a tie-in to the rest of the décor. 

First I tried white bows, like I used last year. In my head they looked good, but in reality they were way too much for this look.

Next I tried a double faced ribbon of bright green with a red interior and it felt just right to me. 

You see our tree is full of family memories and almost every ornament has a story to tell so they are brightly colored and all different shapes and textures.

The little glimpse of red on the ribbon seemed like the perfect  addition on the tree.

I wish the ribbon was a bit wider, but I used what I had on hand for this year. 

Who knows before the season is over the tree might have wider ribbon. I kept the streamers long because it felt more elegant to me. 

I love a touch of elegance with simplicity. I know our tree is not even close to Simple, but  this is our family tree, and it is perfect in my eyes because of the memories attached to it.

I have a bright green velvet pillow that I will be adding to the white and black chair behind the JOY pillow. It is coming all the way from Ireland.

In this picture you can see  my vintage Chinoiserie pedestal. This is a favorite piece of mine and I love that I can use it in our new home.

Speaking of Chinoiserie, that brings me to my next project……

You might remember this from last year. This  picture shows the wreath in process.

I used an inexpensive black frame as my base. You can read HERE how I made it, if you are interested.

This year I will be hanging my pagoda wreath in our kitchen dining nook. I had to fill in more greenery on the sides so I worked on that yesterday. I will show you all the pictures once I get the dining area all dressed up.

I hope you are all having as much fun decking your halls as I am!!

 

BTW:  Just click on the underlined site.......Ribbon purchased from Nashville wraps, Paper mart and Ribbon shop.
The double faced ribbon that is green on one side and red on the other purchased at Costco.

 

 

My First Christmas Mess In My New House!!

What is that saying about you have to create a mess before you can create beauty. Well, that is what I am doing in my new house.

I don’t even mind the mess because it is the very first time we get to decorate our new home for Christmas.

The first thing I did was bring in the pillows and switch out the covers. I had feathers all over me. 

Just in case you did not already know this, don’t wear all black when decorating for Christmas.

Then the rug had to be adjusted and the tree box came in. I get the job of fluffing up the branches. 

It felt like such a good idea last year to sprinkle snow on the branches. This year, NOT so much. I had faux snow all over me and the floor. LOL 

Still having fun and it won’t dampen my spirit!!

Just like most years some of the lights did not work, in fact the whole top of the tree did not work. 

Hubby had to go to the store to buy more lights. I don’t think he was too happy, or in the falalala spirit with that one.

I put a smaller tree in my kitchen area that is in a white square pot, and it has white lights. I love the simplicity, and how the green looks against the white walls.

Ooops I need to hide the cord!! Don’t you just hate cords showing?

Next came the wreath for the front door.

This year I decided to use a preserved boxwood wreath and found the best deal at Target.

My color scheme this year is going to be greens and white with my base of black and white so I carried that out onto my porch. Here is the collage I made of my plan….

I also had an inspiration picture for my wreath. I took creative freedom and did my own interpretation that feels more like my home.

I love the look of this one, and before it is all said and done, I just might add one more wreath to my configuration.

There was some tweaking along the way before I got it right. I started with this look first, but knew it was not quite right.

I love simplicity, however this was not going to give me the welcome I wanted for my guest. 

I talked with some of my friends who are design enthusiast to see what they thought. 

They all agreed I needed 3 balls not two. One friend suggested making a double loop bow. I listened to them so……

Back to work I went, and I did some tweaking. I added another ball, and another loop, but I took it a step further and made the streamers go down the middle of the back of the wreath. I chose to use 3 streamers at different lengths.

A little tip for you, when making a fish tail streamer, make sure the points are long and slender as opposed to shorter and wider. The longer points have a more elegant look.

I used battery operated lights that I got from Home Depot last year, they work great!

I added two white lanterns on each side of the door, but it still needed more.

I debated on using 4 or 6, but once it was darker and I lit the candles 6 was just too many so I went with the 4 lanterns.

So far I am having a lot of fun. The tree lights are done and the tree is in it’s corner. 

I moved furniture a few inches here and a few inches there and I think we have just the right base to work with now.  

You will be surprised at how much a difference it can make in a room when you take the time to move your furniture even a few inches. Always keep furniture pulled out at least 4-6in. from the wall, giving it some breathing room.

Step back from your room and look at your room from all angles when moving your furniture pieces. You will be happy that you took the time to make it right.

My busy Christmas helper. He always does such a good job putting on the lights. The decorating is up to me, but I think I am going to talk him into helping me this year. Wish me luck.

The room is starting to look like a nice cozy Christmas room. 

I think I am going to have fun decorating the rest of this room. Once I get the ornaments on the tree I will move to the mantel. It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas around here!!!