Fireplace Upgrade-From Drab to Fab

 Before

 Candles at Crate and Barrel

After

This year my home makeover project for the fall/winter was fixing up my dull drab fireplace. I have lived in my current apartment for almost a year and not once have I used the fireplace. It just seemed like too much work to go get the logs. Then I wondered how easy they would be to light, would it smell up the house, etc. etc.. So I just left it as an ugly drab hole in the wall. With winter rolling around I decided something had to be done about it.

The fireplace is on the small side so my first idea to put one of those fireplace candelabras in there failed. My second idea was to make a "fire" out of pillar candles. I started by cleaning out all of the soot and cobwebs. Then I added some black river rock that I got from my mom's house, but you should be able to find some at Michael's or maybe even Lowe's. Next up was a trip to Crate and Barrel where pillar candles were surprisingly cheap. I grabbed four white votive pillars to make up the first row, two small wide, one medium wide, and two medium narrow pillars for the second row. For the third row I ran over to World Market for four large narrow pillars. For these I was able to use one of their $10 off $30 coupons that come in the mail, so I basically ended up with a free one. If you don't get the coupons in the mail you can sign up for their rewards program and they will send you one via e-mail.

I arranged them in the fireplace with the river rock around it, lit the candles and viola! My drab ugly hole in the wall became a fab cozy nook for cold winter nights.