If you've been reading my blog (or you've listened to me swoon over decorating), you know that I LOVE me a decorated mantel. It's one of my favorite places in the house to decorate. Also, because it's such a small space, it's easy to switch up the look for relatively cheap.

I decided to decorate the mantel a little differently this year. I've been obsessed with garland the last few months and I wanted to find a way to work that into my mantel, without doing a pennant garland like I did for Halloween and Andrew's race-car birthday party.

Here are a few of my inspiration pictures:

Houzz
Better Homes and Gardens

Here's what I came up with:


I didn't have any satin ribbon like the second inspiration link (boo hoo!), so I substituted some extra gold garland. I then hung some small ornaments with red ribbon and curled the ribbon ends. I finished the mantel with a picture from Andrew when he was 1 and a hand print of his from that same year. I also added in a few knick-knacks that find their way to my mantel most years. Then I added some holiday picks to fill it out.



What do you think? Have you done anything different with your mantel this year? Are you finding inspiration on Pinterest?