Theme Decorating

I,m not really into theme decorating but sometimes a theme just presents itself to you and you run with it. This is what I was going to do in my family

bathroom this year. I saw this great idea(Thrifty

Decor Chick - it think) and decided to copy it. I got

couple of vintage ornaments from my stash and

some fake snow from the dollar store and plunked

them into an antique canning jar.

Cute ,but, then I

pulled out this little guy

And I thought - he looks a little lonely - hey I have an ornament somewhere with penguins on it and my girlfriend( thanks Kathy) gave me some penguin plates and voila - a theme just happened!

Merry Christmas All

Christmas Mantle

Today I am posting pictures of my mantle all decorated for Christmas. This year (believe it or not) I went with a really simple version of the mantle I have had for the last few years. You see for years and years I didn't have a mantle and I REALLY wanted one. So when we bought the fireplace for this house ( yes it's electric) I really went nuts decorating it. I also always use gold and bronze ornaments with deep red pointsettias and accents of green and cream - told you I go all out. This year I wanted something different - I wanted it to match my kitchen - after all this is an open concept house and the kitchen and living room are one in the same anyway. I may even post pictures of my kitchen (if I get it cleaned up enough)

The Joy letters my daughter made last year from doller store frames and letters and scrapbooking paper. Total cost was under ten dollars. The two large glass clyindar vases were doller store finds and all the orniments were from my stash. The wreath sits on my front door during the spring and summer months and looks a little worse for wear. The garland is a plastic version of cedar garland given to my husband by a customer who happens to be a buyer for Christmas decorations for a large retailer - he buys way in advance so look for this stuff next year. Thats it. Pretty simple - too bad I couldn't have posted it sooner. I will try to get some pictures of my tree and other mantle later today and post those as well - buy for now

This fall I painted and redecorated my laundry room and main bathroom. This is a little side project I worked on as well. The shutters were scavenged from my office and have been kicking arround my garage for years. I cleaned them up and painted them with leftover paint from my other projects( more about that latter). I picked up these super cute little halloween plates from the Halmark store way last summer from the $2.00 table. The spider gives it an added halloween touch. Btw the key above came from goodwill -25 cents. Yea goodwill!

I can't wait to see what I can find for Christmas