Dining Room Shelves & Decorating for Halloween

One thing I really miss about our old house is our fireplace.  In the winter there were very few days we didn't have a fire going.  Our house was small enough that the fire would just about warm up the entire place.  And I love the coziness of a fire.  You can't recreate that, but I have attempted to recreate another aspect of the fireplace, the mantle.  The fireplace was the focal point of our last living room and the mantle was usually decorated for the season.  I was inspired by Shelley at House of Smiths to build my own shelves to decorate.  It just so happens that she built the cafe shelves that I wanted from Ballard Design, for much less than they were at BD. I was really happy with the way they turned out.  They are easy to build and less than $100! You can't beat that.  They are up in our dining room and ready for Halloween!

HomeGoods is usually my go-to place for decorating, but I also find some great things at World Market, garage sales and flea markets. 

I made this plate using my Silhouette.  Whenever I see a unique plate or dish on clearance I usually grab it. You never know what you might be able to do with it.

You see the strip running across the bottom of my shelf?  That wasn't there originally and I am a little bummed you can see it, but it turns out there's a large metal air conditioning vent running behind the wall where I was going to hand the shelves.  I had to get creative and find a different way to hang the them and this seemed to be my only option.  

I don't normally do skulls but I was feeling it this year...

A view of the shelf from underneath.  If anyone is wanting to build one I think this picture sums up how I did it....I think... I took some pictures to document the process.  I will try to post them soon!

Thanks for dropping in!