Halloween Mantel ~ Elegant and Whimsical ~ Black and White Halloween Decor

Even those who love mostly soft and neutral decorating, sometimes crave a bit of contrast or a splash of color. Especially this time of year. You can add a touch of elegance to your Halloween decor by simply playing with the time tested combination of black and white. Add some warm tones of gold and the sparkle of silver and you have a more grown up version of Halloween decorating.. 

The mantel this year is dressed in black and white again. Whatever your own favorite colors,  you can certainly decorate even for Fall and Halloween with the the colors you love. Even if that happens to be without the strong orange or red of the season. You might enjoy the stunning display of the turning of the leaves outside but still like a more neutral look inside. Give it some contrast like black and white, or keep it monochromatic. It can still be very festive and fun!

I'm fortunate to have a few pretty black and white artworks to display this time of year. On the mantel this time is a print of my own art, The Wizard. It was done many years ago, and although  I consider it to be simply fantasy art, it makes  a great addition for Halloween when everyone thinks of magic.

The MacKenzie-Childs star ornament is nice for Halloween, even though I usually bring it out for Christmas and New Year's decorating.  It adds another element of black and white and silver, and repeats the the harlequin design as well.

 The crows are merry and in a party mood with little witchy hats and decorative collars. This one is sitting on top of a faux (foam) pumpkin painted with Annie Sloan chalk paint. The mercury glass pumpkin and gourd sparkle and reflect light, with one perched atop a cute harlequin patterned urn. A few spiders complete the whimsical feeling. They are only invited inside this time of year, and only if they aren't real!

See Y'All Soon~

~ Happy Easter!

Wishing You

a Very, Happy Easter!

See Y'All Soon~

~ Happy New Year!

 

Will there be a long, or short, list of resolutions for you this year? I think the new year will be another good one to just re-focus a bit. The year in review was a productive one for getting  many things done around the house which had to be done. It's always like that when you live in an older house. Like us, they need a bit more upkeep with the passing years, but we're worth it, we think.

This is a close up of that pretty MacKenzie Child's harlequin star that brings out the black and white motif for Christmas decorating, and now for New Year's as well. The shiny silver with the black is a perfect complement to the Mercury glass.

~ White Christmas Time

It was Christmas tree shopping time this weekend for us,  and this year's tree is awaiting its adornments. The next couple of days will be happily spent listening to Christmas music and deciding what do this year. My guess it will still be the same neutrals of lots of white with silver and Mercury glass with a dash of color. Time to get the boxes in and see what surprises I'll find that I completely forgot about having stored away.  Hope your week is going wonderfully, too!

If you would like to see how the finish was created on this 

vintage frame with the Madonna, click HERE.

~ See Y'All Soon ~

~ Halloween Mantel 2014 -The Decorated House - Elegant Black and White Decorating

Instead of all the spooky stuff, you can choose to enchant with a more elegant style when decorating for this fun packed holiday! It's almost Halloween time again, and that means it is a perfect time for adding some elegant black back into the decorating mix. Black and white has always been such a classic combination. I like to add Vintage Silver and Mercury glass, and Old Books ... along with a tiny bit of spookiness. The only really spooky thing is those spiders! Spiders are not one of my favorite guys outside, but

~ The Decorated House - Easter Mantel 2014

There was a time when there were a lot of bunnies around here. None of them were real rabbits; those do not come to play in my garden. Which is probably a good thing since I've heard they like to eat a lot of plants and flowers that you did not intend growing for them.

But when Easter and Spring come along each year, it seems that the my bunnies have multiplied even though  I haven't bought one in years. And I swear I gave a bunch away. None the less, this time of year, I'm usually surprised and delighted to see them and quite happy some have stayed around.

The mantel is dressed this year with an Art Print from my Shop, The Bunny Chandelier. Printed in gray, it looks really wonderful in that old gray painted frame that I used the chalk paint on. The altered - decorated peat pots and the paper and fabric covered eggs with the leaping bunnies are also being used again this year. Along with the vintage style bunnies, I've added a couple of hand made clay mushroom houses that I  have had for 30 years. They stay in a cupboard with glass doors so dust doesn't settle on all that intricately made elements.

The Bunny Chandelier is available in 8 x 10 in or 5 x 7 inch in my shop

by clicking on this word link.

The Decorated House Bunny Chandelier on Etsy
It is available in Tiffany Blue, Pink, Black and Gray.  

You can click on the picture link below for last Easter's decorations and

some directions on how to make you own pretty peat pots.

This little Easter bunny is my favorite. The plastic gray egg next to him is painted with Paris gray ASCP. From the closeup of the mushroom house you can see how fantastic details the artist gave to each of her magical creations. Perfect for welcoming the magic of Spring!

See Y'All Soon~

~ Valentine's Day Mantel 2014 - The Decorated House

 The mantel is dressed very simply for Valentine's Day this year. One of my favorite art prints that we have illustrating one of my favorite stories, Beauty and the Beast, is at the center. I spent so many hours in elementary school reading fairy tales. This is one of those stories

~ Merry Christmas! from Our Home to Yours

From Our Home to Yours,

Wishing you all the Joy of the Season.

Merry, Merry Christmas!

~ Christmas ~ White and Silver with Mercury Glass

 

Each year it is a joy to share our Christmas decorating  with new and old friends who stop by this blog.  The colors are much the same this year in the living room, lots of white and silver, with accents of Mercury glass,  and a little touch of black. The tree is filled with a few overprice ornaments like the Mackenzie Childs stars and a few Radkos, but much more you will find the very inexpensive ornaments like the snowflakes and the black and silver ornaments that I painted to go with the stars. Snowflakes and baby's breath bring more white and light to the beautiful green of the noble fir tree. This year's tree is topped with

~ Hello October ~ Countdown to Halloween! Pumpkin Topiary

It is the joyful month of October! One of the fun things I've seen around Blogland in the last few years is  the different inventive kinds of a count down "clock" for kids to count the days until  Halloween. I wish someone had thought of that when I was young. It would have made this fun Holiday last longer. Even if there is no count down clock around here we are still on Halloween watch anyway. And the fun is just about to begin. With just one little project at a time. 

For the last few years there has been a pumpkin topiary somewhere in the decor. I like the combination of the black and white with a little soft pumpkin color too. The light streaming in through the window bounces playfully around the silver pieces and actually makes the matte black pumpkin a bit shinier looking in the photo. This year I made the topiary in a Mercury glass goblet.  The Mercury pumpkins are a delightful addition again this year. The fun reflective sparkle certainly brightens the mood Fall, and adding more Mercury glass pieces just adds to the reflective light.

You can make a topiary of your own out of faux pumpkins that you can keep and rearrange year after year. The bottom white pumpkin and the top peachy gourd are both ceramic, but you can easily use foam ones instead. It best to use a foam one for the middle, and maybe the top as well, because you might need to poke a hole in the bottom if the pumpkin below it has a stem that you want to hide. I used some sticky putty to keep the top one in place since I could not poke a hole in the ceramic gourd.

The pumpkins started out that ugly orange color that most inexpensive faux pumpkins are born with. For the white pumpkin and soft pumpkin colored gourd I started out with Annie Sloan Chalk Paint in Old White. The white one was then dry brushed with some Pure White. The gourd was painted with Old White mixed with red and yellow to get the soft pumpkin color, then dry brushed with Old White. The black pumpkin was spray painted with either Fusion or Universal black paint.  Both spray paints are very good for painting the foam. Of course you can also use a liquid latex although you may have to touch them up over the years if you don't use a primer.

Come back soon to see more clips of Halloween decorating, and then a post of all the elements of the whole holiday decor.

~ See Y'All Soon ~

~ The Decorated House Halloween Decor - Mantel 2013

You can hear it all throughout Blogland right now, almost everyone loves this time of year. As I've said before, I am no exception.  For me it is another reason to be joyful and celebrate everyday. And to at last cool down a little bit and open the windows. And ..... to decorate the mantel for Halloween!
This I totally love doing. It's a chance to embrace magic and whimsy and just remember the fun of being a kid this time of year.

~ A Little Fall Home Tour ~ Vintage with New - Decorating the Fall Mantel

 

Fall Mantel 2013

Fall is in the air, even way down in the South. We too are being coaxed to embrace the new season, ever so gently as each morning is a bit cooler,  just a little bit.  

The Fall Mantel reflects our Autumn. The large sycamore leaves are just starting to turn and lots of green ones are already covering the ground. Shades of rust are still mixed with the beauty of green, and yellow is showing off,  too.

It seems like just about everyone is eager to see Fall this time of year. The days are shorter,  but the evenings are cooler and the promise of stunning colors of leaves and sunsets woo us into the new season. I am no different except I walk slowly into this time of year relishing the last days for summer, and the evening walks with the sun still shining.  But Fall is one of my most favorite times as well. 

 

 Several years ago, an artist created 2 custom paintings for me, this one with the terracotta pot and chipmunk (I'm not a farm girl if I have my critter wrong) and another one with a pretty baby blue bird. He asked what animals and colors and I wanted and this is what he painted. They were perfect for the way I decorated years ago. Sometimes when you put something away for a while, it is extra special all over again when you find it. And so it is with this delightful painting. 

The mantel is a charming mix of vintage and new. New leaves, both real and faux, playfully accent the fabulous handmade pottery pieces, vintage green pottery, silver and antique books. The peachy colored gourds were painted with Annie Sloan Chalk Paint and other acrylics last year. The colors are still perfect for my fall decor. 

Bowing to the beauty of nature, there is a real bird's nest in the center with the original white cottony type element that the bird used to build it. This was a rescued, abandoned nest we found several years ago and which I use very often just because I love it so  much .

 

This vase is the last piece we collected. The sister vase to this one was purchased more than 20 years earlier. When we found the same artist at a large art show, we fell in love with this lidded vase and added it to our art pieces. At that time I was using a lot of brown as an accent color. Bringing it out to a new setting and time  makes it special to us all over again.  Here is is shown with vintage silver and milk glass, and ASCP painted  pottery gourd,  a moss ball and some sycamore leaves.

 

Thanks for stopping by and sharing some Fall decorating with me.
I have a few more Fall decor pictures, so come by again.

See Y'All Soon~

Bunny Easter Egg ~ The Decorated House

A little different twist on the decorated Easter egg. I experimented with covering some cheap plastic eggs with different materials.  Burlap, antique ledger paper, antique French book pages, cheesecloth, linen, and paint! Sometimes combinations of two or more. This is one of my favorites. 

A black silhouette would have been pretty, but this year I'm using light and medium grays instead. The grays are a great combination with the green of the moss and very complementary to the shades of gray in the antique tart tins.

........................................................... 

Tips for making your own & What I used in the picture above:

~ Valentine's Mantel 2013 - The Decorated House

Pink and gray with a touch of red and shiny silver and Mercury glass are the decorating colors for Valentine's Day here this year. The beautiful bougainvillea is blooming right now and it was tempting to bring it in for the mantel like last year.  But it sheds quite a bit and doesn't really last that long. So instead a simple hand made paper flower is in an antique glass bottle until

~ Halloween Mantel 2012 - Decorating in Black & White 2

There were questions around here as to why Beau Bunny was being blamed for the missing Snickers. He is pleading the 5th, and hasn't confessed to eating them. Well the truth is he has been jumping from spot to spot, quite full of excess sugar energy, there are empty wrappers left exactly in places where he was seen. On top of that Beau Bunny always has a spare bandito mask, and one was left hanging on the mantel after he was seen there. I know, all circumstantial. We might need to set up

~ Christmas Mantel Decorations 2011

It's been several Christmases since the beauty of Mercury glass caught my eye. I don't think I'll get tired of it anytime soon. It's wonderful to use all year round, but it really is beautiful at Christmas with all the lights shimmering off of it.

I wanted to keep it as simple as possible this year. In the past we have enjoyed different traditional Christmas colors in this room and on the mantel, but it is mostly white and silver this time. And lots of tiny lights.

Sometime during the past year I found the Mercury glass crown and the decanter knowing that they would be a welcome addition to the other decorations at Christmas. Still everything else was from years past. Using not only what we had, but using a lot less.

I've found many ways to decorate with the large Mercury glass tree each holiday season. I've seen some smaller ones being displayed this year and it's difficult not to look a few of those to go with the big one. So far so good.....

If you have been by previously, you probably know this is a faux fireplace with an antique fire insert that we created several years ago. I always love it, but at Christmas maybe just a little bit more. Thanks for stopping by and sharing Christmas.

See Y'All Soon~
Donna