My Thanksgiving Mantel & Decor

Boy am I ready for Thanksgiving. I can't help it. I just love all that great food. This year, for the first time, I will be hosting Thanksgiving at our home. As part of the holiday spirit we just have to have a colorful Thanksgiving setup. 

The wooden frame is a distressed picture frame with chicken wire that I use in my craft room, and I used a free printable for a Give Thanks banner to create my mini banner. I used this scenic fall picture on Pinterest for my small silver beaded picture frame.

The chalkboard art is a vintage mirror with the mirror reversed and painted with chalkboard paint - and the mirror is still usable! The printed subway sign is inspired by ExpressionsWallArt on Etsy.

We also thought it would be great to do a Thankful Tree this year. The girls are really enjoying it and it's a good reminder of what we have to be thankful for. Our tree is made from branch lights and our tags are scrapbook paper cut to different shapes.

 

What is your favorite piece of Thanksgiving decor? Don't forget to check us out on Remodelaholic.

My Halloween Vignette

I absolutely LOVE Halloween. It is the only time of year that I can comfortably put my dark and wild side out on display (without the concerned stares of visiting family members and neighbors). We have a year-round collection of Halloween paraphernalia displayed throughout our house, so I love being able pull it all together and really let it all hang out.

Our home has a very strange randomly placed tile window on one of the bare walls, so that is where I decided to begin. I gathered some of the items from our collection and started going wild.

I found some colorful pictures online of some of our favorite characters from classic horror movies. I wanted to add a lot of color to the top of the "window"so I found the brightest images, and couldn't resist the tattooed Bride of Frankenstein. I added them to a few black frames we have hanging around the house and hung them with black ribbon in offset lengths.

I picked up several items from the Dollar Tree, including the black and orange twigs, the cut-out bats and spiders, the cool mummy statue, the little skeletons an birds, and the supplies to make the Gothic votive candle holders (instructions are here). The glitter pumpkins are from Target.

I loved the skeleton terrariums I kept seeing on Pinterest, so I decided to add one to our mantel also. I grabbed a 5" glass candle stand that I had laying around and topped it with moss. Then I cut a tombstone from styrofoam and painted with silver craft paint. Once it dried I drew on a little design with permanent marker and added my character. Voila! I didn't have a bell lid, but it looks good to me!

Say cheese!

It was an easy vignette and the family loves it. My husband decided we're keeping it up all year! 

DIY Halloween Votive's With A Little Sparkle

If you're looking for an easy Halloween decoration that will add a little wicked sparkle, this is one is great and cheap to do - and it's one we'll use year-round.

Supplies
Two glass candle holders (Dollar Tree)
Two tall cylinder glass votives (you need ones with a flat surface and they're usually at the dollar tree)
Looking Glass Spray Paint
Halloween Stickers - mine were on sale at Michael's
Spray bottle with water
E6000 Clear Adhesive

I purchased most of my supplies at Dollar Tree, with the spray paint and stickers from Michael's. There really wasn't a huge selection of wicked Halloween stickers, but I liked these glitter skulls and spider webs.

I found a great tutorial on, of course Pinterest, on how to create the look of mercury glass. I took the glass votives and covered the outside with painters tape to prevent the spray paint from touching the outside of the glass. I lightly spritzed the inside of the votive with water and then sprayed the inside of the glass with Looking Glass spray paint. The paint will pool at the bottom and you want to just roll it around inside the votive and let it dry.

Once the votive is dry, glue to glass candle holder to the bottom the votive using E6000 clear adhesive and let it dry.

To finish it off, place your Halloween stickers on the outside of your new candle holder. The adhesive on the scrapbook stickers I purchased worked great and they're hanging on really well. If you'd like to secure it better you can coat the adhesive side of the stickers with the E6000 adhesive or you can cover the sticker with Modge Podge.

We're All A Little MAD