Before and After: The Mantle

A long, long time ago, I said I was going to do a Before and After series on here to showcase all the work that we (Ben) has done to our house. I apologize to those of you that were looking forward to seeing all of my hubby's handiwork and week after week were disappointed that I instead chose to talk about things like pirates and American Idol. Well, wait no more! I am turning over a new leaf and have decided it's time to pick this back up.

I'm also sorry if you were excited to see Before and Afters of the bathrooms, which is what I alluded to doing next. I thought we were done with them, but since then, I have some new ideas for the mirrors, so I want to wait until that is done before I show them.

On to the mantle...

We are lucky enough to have a double-sided fireplace in our house. When we moved in, one side had a HUGE mantle and the other side had nothing- just tile surrounding it. Well it wasn't long before Ben had inspected every single one of our friend's mantles and told me that he could build one EASILY on the side that had no mantle, which thrilled me to no end because where else was I going to hang our fancy Christmas stockings??

Here is before:

This is right after we moved in, so please dont't judge the cleanliness and junk...we were still unpacking

And here is after:

Apparently it was pretty simple to make, but Ben says that about pretty much everything, so I don't know if he's telling the truth or just being humble :) Either way, I love it and it really adds a lot to the room. Since it's one of the first things you see when you walk in our house, we needed to make a good impression and it defintitely helps! I am constantly changing and second-guessing what I put ON the mantle, and I think it needs some more color or something else, but that is as good as it gets for now. The mantles in our house have become my decorating Mount Everest, so stay tuned.

The other side of the fireplace in our family room really deserves its own post, so I'll save that for another day :)