My Valentine's Day Mantel

Hi all, 

How are you?  We are out at the lake trying to relax a little. 

I wanted to get some photos of our Valentine's Day mantel up. 

I also have a little video to share with you. 

 Valentine's Day Mantel 

I do not really watch T.V. anymore. Instead I watch YouTube. I control the content that goes into my mind. "Be careful little eyes what you see." comes to mind. I just can't do regular T.V.

I've been watching a lot of home decor YouTube channels. I've decided to give it a try. I'm not giving up my blog but I thought this would be in addition to it. 

Click on the link to get to my channel. If you watch YouTube, I'd love it if you would subscribe. 

Trust me. It's not going to be anything fancy but I thought you'd like to see a little more than a blog post can show you. 

I showed you the LOVE shutter in my Ten on the 10th post. 

The banner was made from scrapbook paper. The preschool cutting skills came in handy for that one. 

My red truck got some shredded tissue, a pip berry heart and a quilted heart. The I'm sure the pip berries were from a candle ring. It's super easy to shape a few berries into a heart. 

The quilted heart came from one of my favorite antique stores in Sulpher Springs, Texas. 

It usually stays out until fall. 

I've been slow to the tiny fairy light game. I bought a string a few years ago and they didn't work so I guess I was put off by them. These work great and they are on a timer so they'll turn on each evening. 

The clock was a $5.00 Goodwill find. The pitcher has been around a long time. I found it at an estate sale when we lived in Lubbock - long before white ironstone was in style. 

It got knock off of the mantel last night during the evening dog toy toss. Fortunately, it wasn't damaged. I'm not sure how, though. It's a good 5 foot drop from the mantel to the floor. 

The coffee pot came from an antique shop in Clifton, Texas. 

The gold frame is a recent estate sale find for $1.50.

The crock is a family piece but had been in the yard. 

The white candlesticks were collected. I've put battery operated candles in them. They're also on a timer. 

If you haven't been with me a while, you may not realize that I made the fireplace surround. 

The existing floating mantel was orange oak. In a fluke moment Bill told me I could paint it. I painted it the next morning before he changed his mind. 

This was before I painted nearly everything that couldn't run away. 

Now he is used to it. More importantly, he is okay with it. 

The white floating mantel didn't look right on the brick and it needed more. I went out into the garage, grabbed some scrap wood and stuck them vertically in between the hearth and the mantel. 

These are wedged in. They are not screwed to the brick but are screwed to each other. 

The area between the bottom of the mantel and the opening was filled in with more scrap lumber.  

Fluted molding dresses up the vertical pieces of wood. 

Two years later, I decided to add something to the top too. 

I went back out to the garage and foraged for scraps. Beadboard, 2x2s and fluted molding were thrown together and wedged inbetween the top of the mantel and the ceiling. Nothing has been drilled into the brick here either. It can all be removed but who would want to? 

I love our fireplace now. 

Here are the blog posts about the two fireplace makeovers. 

Transforming a 90's Fireplace 

Faux Planking On The Fireplace

I'm a little surprised I did all that. 

Am I still that adventurous? 

There you have it. I hope you have a good weekend. I guess some of you are expecting snow.

Thanks for stopping by. 

Katie 

Here is video I shot at Christmas. 

A Stroll Thru LIfe

The Fireplace Surround

Hi everybody!

We are getting some much needed rain!

We've been dealing with a little bit of a health crisis with Bill's mom. Nothing serious but we've got to get her up and moving again. Prayerfully, she will be on her way to rehab soon. 

I'm not here to show anything off today. 

???

I know. Hard to believe. I need to ask you a question.

This is how our fireplace looks today.

This is how it looked three years ago. This was about a month after I started blogging.  

I don't know if you were around then but in a random moment, Bill said I could paint the mantel. 

He doesn't believe in painting good wood so it was very out of the ordinary. 

So the very next day on August 10, 2012 I painted the mantel. 

Let me stop for a minute. 

To the best of my understanding, fireplace mantel is spelled MANTEL

A covering or mantle is spelled MANTLE, 
"The snow provided a mantle of white upon the ground."

However, I've seen them flip flopped quite a bit. 

What do you think? Is it a regional thing? Feel free to weigh in below. 

Now back to our riveting story...

Painting the mantel wasn't enough for me so I rooted around in the garage and found some scrap wood to make a surround. 

I absolutely had no plan. I just started cutting and hammering. 

I was completely in love. 

Last September I made this piece of wall art to bring in more white. 

Here is my question. 
Should I white wash the brick?
or
I thought about making a permanent white paneled top for above the mantel.
What do you think?
Should we leave it as is? It is enough white?
You can see my Cozy Fireplaces board on Pinterest. 

There is a lot of brick surrounding this fireplace.

Now onto a different subject. 
Months and months ago, I asked you what you thought I should do with the piano.  
I decided to leave it until I find the perfect piece. it is staying for now.  

I hope you all are having a great Sunday!
Final question.
What do you say? Y'all or You Guys?

Katie 

Mantel Update / Transforming a 90's Fireplace

We had two sides of the family over the other day. My brother was over and 

Bill's sister and her boys were here too.

My husband made the comment that he didn't think the living room was comfortable because he and his sister ended up sitting in the kitchen.
I was feeling dissatisfied with the living room after my reveal last week. It just doesn't wow me anymore. 

I tried to think through what the issues could be.

Dave was watching the game and was stretched out on the couch.

 The T.V. in here is really pretty small and there were not any lights on so he could see the T.V.  It is housed in an antique armoire.  Bill thinks that is the issue. He thinks the armoire is outdated.

 I really don't think that his sister was repelled from the living room because of a piece of furniture we have had since the 80s. 

One of the issues I have with the room is the huge brick fireplace.
I have seen all the cute pins and blog posts about mantels.
Frankly, I was sick of mine.
When we moved in, I loved it. 
Our first house didn't have a fireplace. Our second house didn't have a mantel for the first year or so.
Our third house had a 70's mantel that was painted white.
This mantel was perfect for 1990!
I loved hanging the stockings at Christmas. I love having the kids pose for pictures in front of it.
I loved draping it with garland.

But I had fallen out of  love with it.
It was a big, boring sea of brown.
I felt many times that we lucked out in getting tan brick instead of red. Many houses on the street have red brick. The tan is a little more neutral. I was also happy that we didn't have the brass and glass insert with the doors like some of the other 90's homes.

I have tried to photograph the fireplace many times and got very few usable shots. 

I thought it was hard to photograph because it is on window wall and that the sun made the grout lines look like a checkerboard or something. All my pictures were blurry.
It has been frustrating.

This room has changed over the years. It used to be very sunny and almost too hot. 

The neighbor's tree in the back and my trees in the front are providing tons of shade. I have never lived in a house this long, so I haven't seen the evolution of light as trees mature.

To me it looked like a typical 90's fireplace that needed to be updated. 
I have been wanting to paint the mantel since I took pictures of it this past spring.

I never suggested painting the mantel or the brick because I never thought he would go for it in a million years.
Bill is a huge fan of craftsman design and he loves old oak.

Since he was lamenting about the living room I mentioned that I thought the hearth was the issue.... and that we need to think about updating it. First I mentioned dry walling over it.
When that didn't get a thrilled response I casually mentioned painting it. Now... it sounds like I was trying to manipulate the situation but I wasn't. I was genuinely trying to figure out a solution. 
He said yes he thought we should try paint. (Paint is way easier than dry wall.)

I am never one to look a gift horse in the mouth so I proceeded to break out the primer and paint the very next morning.  

I  slapped the primer on and thought it needed more. 
It needed columns under the mantel to beef up the sides and provide a pallet for more white.
I went out to the stash of wood in the garage just to see what might work.

I grabbed a leftover piece of a 2x4 and low and behold two in a L configuration fit perfectly over the brick edge of the fire box. :)

I screwed them together. 
This is where the drill driver becomes important. 
Learning the forward and backward motion as well as inserting the drill bits and the screwdriver is key. 
I used 2 2x4's to make the columns. Bill said they were about $5.00 each. 

 I'd like to tell you that I knew exactly what I was going to do at this point to finish this.

 I thought about stacking two by fours and attaching them to the brick. I would have had to research masonry bits to do that. I finally figured out that I could just attach the back to each side. I had an old shelf from the Creepy Doll Room (here) 

for the back. I cut and ripped another board and attached it to each side to make the back of the surround. (The second board was supposed to be used for my laundry room make over.)

Read about it here.

I went to Home Depot and got some fluted molding to cover up the seams. 

 The molding in the center was just some casing that looked like crown molding. It was easier to work with than crown. The total for the trim was under $40.00. Trimming it out was easy, because I didn't have to miter anything.

 The surround fits snug under the mantel so I didn't even have to attach it to the brick. I don't know how to drill into brick at all!
I wanted to finish this while he was at work, so that if it didn't look good I could just shove it in the garage. Plus I didn't want to over engineer this thing. Did I just imply that Mr. Bill might 
over-think some stuff?? Take it as you will...

Slipping a sale ad behind the mantel and columns prevents paint on the brick. This would be very hard to tape. 

I primed it as soon as I was finished and sat and enjoyed it just primed. 

I'm hoping that by lightening up a big, brick feature that I am warming up the space.

Primed and painted and back with cute accessories.

  I know that in the paragraph it takes to write this, I

make it seem that this was super easy. It was a pain. The screws I used were horrible and worthless. Tip? Use good screws! 

When I went to fit it, it was a hair too wide. (I did measure, several times.) When I went to adjust the width of the back, the screws stripped and nearly caused me to scream because I couldn't get them out. Maybe I did scream.

I finally came up with two methods. Tape inside the stripped screw head or drill tiny holes all around the stripped screw until you can pry it out.

 

 It was 110 yesterday. By the time I was finished I was so hot and sooo crabby!

But I am so in love with it. 
I have always wanted a white traditional style mantel.

The new fireplace surround makes a huge difference in the look of the mantel. 

Before:

After: 

When Bill got home tonight from Bible Study, he stood in the
kitchen and said, "I don't think we can paint the mantel." 
Opps!!
Too late. 
He came in and saw it and he said, "I am not worthy." 
:)

Sprinkled with construction dust,
Katie
Linking with,
Funky Junk Interiors
Feathered Nest Friday 
The Brambleberry Cottage 
Common Ground 
Between Naps on the Porch 
Debbie Doos 
Savvy Southern Style 
Lavender Garden Cottage
Faded Charm