This was such an easy mantel to put together. Simple and sweet, just how we like to celebrate our holiday.
Find a few white dishes, red candles and spare frames . . .
make a Valentine’s wreath. . .
and grab a super cute printable from Funky Polkadot Giraffe (love the Princess Bride reference) . . .
Done! A super simple, but totally cute, mantel for your sweetheart!
Do you decorate for or even celebrate Valentine’s Day?
I’ve seen so many cute, simple place card ideas around the web this year so I thought I would round them up in one place for you. Some of these would take 10 minutes or less to throw together. That’s my kind of project for the holiday season!
Place cards may not seem like a huge thing but I like to think that it is all in the details. When you pay attention to the little things, even if your guests don’t realize why, you’ve made them feel more at home.
Pumpkin Place Card by Oh Happy Day
Bittersweet Ball Place Card by Karen Lidbeck-Brent
Fruit place card by Sew Many Ways
Napkin Placecard by Country Living
Quick Place Card by Martha Stewart
All of these place settings are so fun, it’s hard to choose one of them. Which one is your favorite?
Thanksgiving seems to get bypassed all around the country every year. Even in our home I don’t usually decorate for Thanksgiving or make it a priority. Of course we gather with our family to share dinner together, but that day is the only time we think about it.
This year I wanted to make sure we were being thankful all month so we are using this family Thanksgiving activity and the leaves are being added to a piece of twine on the mantel each day.
This mantel was finished in under 20 minutes. I had a group of friends over for a soup swap last weekend and I wanted to get the Halloween stuff down and something new up. I hope this will help you see a beautiful mantel doesn’t have to take a lot of time to complete. Just use what you have, pull from other areas of your home, and maybe make a quick DIY to finish it off.
One of the easiest parts about a Thanksgiving mantel is that you can pull nature in and it looks amazing for this time of year. We have an overabundance of pine cones in our backyard so I used a bunch of those plus a few gourds that I bought a couple of weeks ago. You could also use branches or fill mason jars with acorns or leaves.
Remember the frame I painted? It’s now on the mantel with a chalkboard background to write on. I also added a few candles. Candles are my favorite thing to add, they make a room so cozy.
It still looked a little bare but I remembered I had some brown packing paper in the garage. I made pinwheels out of those, hung them up, and it looked perfect!
Do you know how to make a pinwheel? It’s super easy. Let me show you real quick.
Pinwheel Tutorial
Not too bad for under 20 minutes, woohoo!
Linking up to Tatertots & Jello and Organize and Decorate Everything!
If you haven’t discovered Edie yet you are missing out on some huge inspiration for so many areas of life. She participated in the 31 days series and wrote about hospitality. The whole series was fantastic, you should go read it now!
Two of the posts that have been sticking with me ever since were the ones about hospitality beginning in the bedroom. For some reason our bedroom always gets the shaft. Every other room in the house seems to get special treatment compared to ours. Our bedroom ends up being the holding area for things I don’t know what to do with and toys migrate there and even though it’s clean it just seems like it’s always in disarray.
After reading Edie’s posts I was determined to do something about our bedroom. I want it to be cozy and warm, beautiful and romantic, a welcoming place for us to share our lives and hearts. A place where we are super comfortable hanging out together and making time to put each other first.
Over the next few months it is going to go through some dramatic changes. I have before pictures to show you and I’m a bit embarrassed about the lack of anything exciting in here. But, if we are starting from here it can only get better!
Clutter, clutter everywhere. The crocheted blanket was a gift and while I love the warmth and heaviness it should really be under the bedspread for the look I’m going for in here. The only wall art in the entire room is a picture my son drew of mario. I love his drawings, but maybe not hanging here.
Yowzers, more clutter on the dresser. That dresser was free! I think it’s going to end up in the nursery so that will be getting a makeover pronto!
Everyday mess, please don’t judge!
Not looking good from this direction either.
I love to read and journal, but I didn’t have a nightstand. I finally found one at a yard sale last month after a year of searching. It needs a makeover and will be holding that mess soon, yay!
After those revealing pictures, here is a pinboard with some ideas of where I want this room to go. I think it is so helpful to start pinning images that strike you for some reason no matter what part of the house you are decorating. The color palette will include yellow and gray. A bunch of fun DIY projects are planned for this room now as well. I have a nightstand to makeover, pillows to make, wall gallery items to conjure up, and who knows what else.
What room in your house could use a total makeover?
Yesterday we saw how easy it is for paint to transform a space, today let’s take a look at fabric. Fabric is one of my favorite things to use to give something old or boring a new look. For my new chalkboard wall command center I started with some cork tiles I found at a yard sale.
I decluttered what was actually on the fridge, but there are still some things that need to be readily available. Instead of the fridge I wanted to use a bulletin board.
The cork boards are the perfect size, small enough that I can’t keep all the junk unnecessary items. But on my pretty new wall I didn’t just want plain cork board.
I dug through my fabric stash and found a cute green print to use (pretty sure it’s from Joanns).
Quick and Easy Fabric Recover Tutorial
Materials:
1. Lay your fabric wrong side up on the table and place cork tile in the center.
2. Pull one side of the fabric up and around and start stapling the edges down.
The piece of fabric I had was just a tad short, oops!
The cork tiles were really thin so I ended up stacking two together. To cover the bottom I grabbed some white fabric I had and cut a strip.
Staple again and voila! The selvage edge actually came in super handy in this project. I was going to cover the staples with ribbon, but I actually like the funky look of them so I left it alone.
So cute and so easy. The whole project took less than 30 minutes.
Is there a space in your home that could use an update with paint or fabric?
Check out the whole 31 days series here.
This post is being linked up to Tatertots & Jello and Home Stories A to Z.
