Late Summer Mantle

Monday afternoon I rearranged the mantle. First I have to acknowledge that I am not a mantle decorator. Or at least I wasn't until very recently. I was a once-a-year arranger at best, so I can't quite explain why I am so into changing up my mantle regularly now. Maybe I'm getting bored with things at a much faster rate or something - I could probably blame design blogs for that, right? Haa-haa.

I started with a summer theme in mind and wanted to move the shells and sea glass center stage for the last few official weeks of summer. I really wanted to add some height which has always been a challenge with this mantle. Fixing the curtains also helped because the way I've hung them this time framed the mantle much better than they did when they all opened to the opposite side of the window.

It was definitely a game of cat and mouse as I wandered from room to room searching through closets, shelves and drawers looking for things just the right size and shape. Much experimenting and rejecting went on. I came up with some new ways to use old things. The only new expense was the ribbon for my new bunting.

This was a really fun project and I am so excited about it. I was looking for something beach inspired and was going through my craft drawers to see what I had that would inspire me. When I found a bag of vinyl stickers from Hawaii I found 4 that were great but there weren't enough to do a full bunting.

After some thought I decided to try to color copy one and see what it looked like. Still on it's blue backing paper it looked great and created a nice little square to work with. Then I put three of them on a sheet that all conveniently had a similar blue background and started making multiple copies. I was so pleased with the faded slightly aged look they came out with on the copies.

Then I went through my stacks of paper looking for a paper that the blue and white would really pop on top of. This green was the winner by far. I quickly figured out my dimensions for each flag and started cutting and gluing. I loved it from the start and after looking through my ribbon supply I felt very strongly that I didn't have anything that was worthy of these flags I loved so much.

So I ran to the fabric store to find something that was pretty enough to hold it's own with the little Polynesian flags. I love these little paper buntings because they hold up really well and can easily be stored to use again and again.

I figure this arrangement will carry me through Halloween. I am not a big Halloween gal, so you will laugh to hear that The Man is fully into Halloween including owning a pirate's costume that is worthy of the set of Pirates of The Caribbean. I am not kidding. I have photos to prove it. The Bug also gets quite serious about Halloween, so I'm the odd woman out who needs to make a little more effort to be festive and fun on that day. I can usually be found wherever the crowds aren't on Halloween. It's a great night to go out on a blind date to a nice restaurant, be at an airport, or anywhere the revelers aren't.

I have to get an attitude adjustment on that holiday. I'll start with my mantle. Maybe next I'll plan a pumpkin carving, cake walk, fish pond and some of the other activities I loved from my grade school days at the school Halloween Carnival. Haa-haa.

So how often do you switch up your mantle? What pushes you do to it? What are your biggest challenges when trying to pull it all together? I love hearing your ideas and solutions to tricky things. Thanks for all you share here!

This post is linked up to The Frugal Girls 8/11 Chic & Crafty Party. Check out all the other linked up projects and all the good stuff you can find there!