Decorating a Christmas Mantel

I always get so giddy around November because our home is totally transformed. My children love this time of year and the older ones are now such a big part of all the decorating. I usually start decorating the day after Halloween, but this year, that was not in the stars!

Not only did life seriously get in the way of decorating for Christmas early, but we also had a snafu with our Christmas tree. My older son took the tree down from the attic to surprise us, he put it all together, only to realize that the lights weren’t working!

Good grief!

It took us six hours and a ton of stores to finally find a tree that we loved and could afford. But we prevailed and got a very affordable gorgeous tree! Once the tree situation was fixed, I was able to focus on getting everything else in its place.

This year I kept with last year’s frosted berries and candy canes look in our living room. I decided to fill the mantel with different sized wreaths. A few new wreaths and a couple new accent pieces and I was able to complete this year’s mantel.

I combined frosted with non-frosted berries as well as some flocked wreaths. Mixing them up gives it some interest and the different textures combine beautifully.

The wreaths by themselves didn’t provide enough height for the mantel so I went on the hunt for a Christmas sign and a couple taller pieces that would achieve that. I found this sign that has great height and contrasts perfectly against the white. Plus, the words couldn’t have been more perfect for the season.

My son set up my gingerbread sets on each side of the mantel. They are so cute and he did a great job at setting up the scenes!

I carefully layered the wreaths in front of each other. This was a balancing act since the mantel is not that wide, but I managed to get everything in its place, and stepped back very slowly without breathing!

I got a couple flocked pine trees to balance the height on the other side and added a few final pieces in the middle and the sides.

I love my “frosted” Frosty! Ryan gave him to me a few years ago, and I think he adds a perfect touch to the mantel.

There you have it! A very easy to put together, wreath-filled mantel.

Merry Christmas!