Previously I mentioned I was trying to decorate the house (i.e. – mantle) in a wintry way now that the Christmas decorations were all down. I worked on the mantle itself but was confounded once again by the sheer expanse of mirror. At least 16 square feet of it. The largish painting I had leaning against it earlier last year is manifestly summery and would not do. Then, I had some inspiration. I thought about how the Christmas garland broke up the expanse, softened the lines and lowered the ceiling. Well…
I crocheted a garland. The leaves are wool.
Hm. I’m still not sure what to think about it.
Here’s the rest of the mantle.
I used a scarf for a runner. It looked cozy.
The flowers were kind of on their way out due to a recent hard freeze.
Any thoughts?
Praying With My Feet 
Your mantle looks gorgeous! I really like how cozy the scarf looks.
I get a lot of unintended laughs from your blog because I'm reading from MN. “A recent hard freeze” had me snickering. You can check the forecast in St. Paul for this week and get giggles of your own.
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I love the crochet 'swag'. If you want to break it up a bit more, I would add multiple crochet strings with flowers.
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Another Elizabeth: (snicker) I was using “hard freeze” in the technical sense: temperatures below 26 in a broad area for several hours (this definition varies from place to place). It's mostly a local warning concerning plants, livestock, pets and exposed pipes. It does have to get pretty cold around here to kill the camellias! Obviously y'all aren't worring about the flowers up there! I remember when we lived near Scranton I was driving home from work one night around midnight. I always passed three banks with their thermometer displays on the way home. It was always a bit of a contest to see which bank would post the lowest temperature. That night one bank said 2 degrees, the next bank said 0 degrees and the third bank said (and this still cracks me up) “-0 degrees”. I guess “-0” is colder than “0”!
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I think it is lovely! I really like hanging garlands about the house. 🙂
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I like it too… very wintery… with lots of whites etc… love the candles…
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I love this! You should post a tutorial and submit it to Craft Gossip! Almost makes me wish I could crochet. 🙂
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Lovely!
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I agree with faerieeva, hanging a couple more varying how they swag.
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I see what the others are saying –the garland is wonderful, but the mirror is so big, it needs “more” — another idea might be to lean some empty frames against it, at least three in different heights if you have them. That would break up the line of all that mirror without adding a lot of pattern.
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It all looks lovely. I especially like the garland. I'm thinking of turning our bowl o' pinecones into a winter garland with some twine…. we'll see. 🙂
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I am incredibly behind on commenting, but I wanted to say that it looks lovely! We FINALLY took down our Christmas decorations about a week ago, but I've left up a little on the fireplace mantel just because it looks pretty. Otherwise, there isn't much in our house as far as decorations go. I saw the Valentine's day garland on Mat. Emily's blog and I think I might put one together, too.
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