Shabby Chic St. Patrick’s Day Mantel

I love shabby chic decor, I know it is all the rage right now, but I hope that it sticks around for a while.  If you are not familiar with what shabby chic is, it is decor that has the appearance of age and signs of wear and tear, or where new items are distressed to achieve the appearance of an antique.  You may also find a lot of use of floral fabrics in shabby chic decor.  When I was thinking of what to put on my St. Patrick’s Day mantel, I knew I wanted to do a shabby chic theme.  Some of the St. Patrick’s Day decorations in stores can get a little cheesy and I did not want to go there.  So I decided to include items with more muted greens, creams and golds.

A while age I made this DIY Magnolia wreath. I love this wreath, it is like the Fixer Upper wreaths at a fraction of the cost!!  I wanted to include this on my mantel because it had the perfect colors that I was going for.  In fact, this is what I matched everything else to.

I had to have something on there that indicated it was a St. Patrick’s Day mantel, so while my in laws were in town, my mother in law and I went looking for a shamrock that would fit in with my theme.  Not having much luck, we finally ran across a plain MDF shamrock at Hobby Lobby.  I entertained several ideas on what to do with it including painting it and covering it with sheet moss, but I decided on covering it with dry brushed wood shims.  I shared all the details on how to make the DIY wood shim shamrock with you last week.  Check out that tutorial to make your own!  🙂

While we were at Hobby Lobby, we also found a couple of green bottles that were the perfect colors and a cool wooden sphere that was half off.  Gotta love the sales at Hobby Lobby!!

I have seen fabric garlands around on Pinterest and loved the look of them.  What a great way to add color to your mantel or as decoration in any room.  It was super easy and I just used fabric that I had on hand so it was a completely free project for me to make.  Here is the tutorial on how to make it.  Looks like I needed to use more steam on those strips though!  LOL.

Throw in a couple moss and twine balls and that is it, you have a shabby chic St. Patrick’s Day mantel.  

Here are a couple shots from further back to give you an overall look at the mantel.

And…just in case you noticed and are wondering what is on the light…

I told you we are big Disney fans, right?!  Just something fun.  🙂  Off to Neverland!!!

I think a lot of people are intimidated with decorating but there is nothing hard about it.  I am by no means an interior designer but a good tip I like to use is to find one item that has several colors in it.  For example, a piece of fabric, artwork that you love or in this case a wreath.  Then just find accessories that match it.  You don’t have to spend a lot of money either, you can DIY a lot of the things you decorate with for so much cheaper!  Don’t believe me?  Check out all of the DIY projects I have on this blog!  🙂  I really believe you can do anything you set your mind to, you just have to try!