A Fireside Chat

We start our little fireside chat here in the Lady's Parlor which took on the most changes before the tour.   The walls in the room were painted Cascade white and everything else was trimmed in white. One project that needed to be done was around the fireplace which needed a new iron insert as the one that was there was broken.  This meant really doing a deep clean on the fireplace itself which I found to be in surprisingly good shape for a home built in 1890.  I am not sure what the inserts are called but I found this one at Relic's in Tampa and thought she would be the perfect one for the Lady's parlor which I decorated with french style furniture in various shades of gray with touches of pink.

Our home has 5 fabulous old mantels and they were so much fun to decorate.  The living room was done in soft robin egg blues however this fireplace had been bricked all the way up except for the round circle.  Hopefully someone reading will tell me what the stove pipe circle is about.

I then found this iron cover and had propped it up over the covered up fireplace.  Since my husband had done such a nice job on putting in the insert in the Lady's parlor I asked him is he could take out the board and stove pipe circle covered insert in the dining room to which he replied, "Sure I can!"

I had started decorating in July and the dining room mantel was complete.  I suppose we expected to find this project to be as easy to replace as the one that he completed first but with a tug of the board an avalanche of soot came cascading down from the chimney and there was no shoving the board back in place in time. Nothing could stop the mountain of soot and no chimney sweep could be found available in our town.   Now I don't know if you remember seeing that all of the furniture in the room was a creamy white but after that day and for several days to follow everything was covered in a black sooty film.   Hubby banned me from the room for the days to follow as he cleaned and cleaned.  Even with all the doors closed our poor little white dog  became grey and black.  She looked like she aged 10 years.  But finally everything became clean again or repainted.  We laugh about it now I promise but for one dark soot covered day we didn't.  It became a story that we told our visitors and they laughed with us.

I promise no one was harmed in the making of this mantel and the thoughts of murder quickly passed when I looked deep in to the dirty face of my beloved.

So our fireside chat has come to a close.

And hubby and I bask in the glow of all the projects that were completed without any bodily harm or one of us killing the other.

Yes, I am pleased to say our marriage is strong.

We survived the Christmas tour.

He learned to say, " Yes Dear," and I learned to close my eyes or step out of the room.   A Lot!!

I'm joining Pamela's Mantel Party at From My Front Porch to Yours
Susan's At Between Naps on the Porch for Met Monday
Kathy @ A Delightsome Life A Return to Lovliness