Mini Mantel Upgrade

By Rachel Scarlett

Although February is almost over and spring is almost here, I have to share a quick post about our mini mantel upgrade. It was a fun and simple project and now I have a little extra shelf room! Our fireplace was a little sad looking and considering we are renters we came up with a non-permanent way to make a mantel.

Sad fireplace.

If you are a carpenter, save yourself some time and don't read how we did this, it was a quick fix and probably does not meet your standards. For this same reason I'm not going to explain this that much.

My husband and I stopped by Lowe's to get a 2x4, some cheap molding, spray paint, and wood glue. This cost somewhere under 20 bucks (I can't find the receipt), not to mention we now have black spray paint and wood glue to spare.

Our little girl learning how to pick out a 2x4 ;)

 We measured and cut the wood and molding down to size, did a little sanding, and as you can see used our high tech plastic clamps and rubber bands to hold the glued pieces together. I then used glossy black spray paint to finish it up. I chose glossy to make dusting easier.

While the finished product is not perfect, it does great things for our fireplace! We thought we would have to use a tiny amount of glue to keep it in place but it is actually just resting on the top ledge of the brick. The width of the ledge is the same as the 2x4. It doesn't slide easy and there's no reason it should come out of place. 

   

  

January was our anniversary month so I still have that decor up; a few wedding pictures and the wooden hearts was our cake topper.

I hope you got a little inspiration out of this, especially if you're a renter!

Thanks for reading!