Our summer and spring mantel.

The moment that this house became ours my mind went wild with ideas. Flooring! Counter tops! Open shelving! Fireplace update! Then we started pricing things and decided to slow down and make easy changes first. The first was painting the walls (All of them. Seriously, Jordan was such a champ) and the brown mantel on the fireplace. With the floors being white and the likely hood of that changing while we live here is slim, we opted to not paint the brick. After the first coat on the mantel, I knew that was a good call and the red started to grow on me.
Before truly was not all that terrible but nothing about it was my taste and I felt like the mantel disappeared into that red brick. We sanded it down and painted it white. After about 3 or 4 coats it was what I had in mind and popped off the brick.
As for decorating, I have always had a love hate relationship with mantels. I love what other people do and I hate what I come up with, which means that it is in a constant state of change. Back in January I threw together a few white things and did not touch it for months. Eventually it grew into what we have currently and I really love it. Now for some low quality iphone pictures!

Here is our mantel before. Again, quality is terrible.

Here is the official before and after. Brighter, cleaner, and some dimension.



After a few coats of paint and some additions I am so happy with how it is looking.

One of the best parts about this vignette is that it holds some of my most favorite items. The cardboard moose head from my brother-in-law (that has lasted 2 moves and we have only had to do minor surgery to keep it together). The picture from my darling friend Lauren's wedding, a faux fashion sketch that I scored at a thrift store in Lubbock, my grandpa's book, and the world's most amazing candle. (AKA: The scent of Anthropologie)

There is a tiny mirror behind the plants (which is reflecting a horrifying image that is actually our giant painting across the living room) that I am still deciding if I want to paint the frame or not. It gets lost behind there but I am somewhat OK with that. We shall see.

At some point I would like to paint the inside of the fireplace to cover the burn marks, but for now, it is toddler friendly-ish and I am obsessed with the white plus touches of blue and green.
As the seasons change I am anticipating adding pops of fall and winter, but for now it feels fresh and clean.