Decorating for Valentines!

One of my goals for the year is decorate my house. It's time my house has style and a touch of class. I have been working on my decorating ideas and decorating for the seasons. I have never LOVED Valentine's Day, EVER. Not even now that I am married, it is just not one of my favorite holidays. But, I remember my mom decorating our house for all the seasons and holidays. I remember the Christmas shower curtain, the cardboard Halloween cut outs and movable skeleton that went up every year; not to mention every other holiday. My mom was, and is, very good at it. I love those memories and I want my child to look back and remember the same things about me. So I am trying this year. REALLY trying. I have about 15 boxes of Christmas stuff that comes out every year and a very small Christmas reject (because I out grew it) box for my very few Valentine items. When you think Valentines, you think hearts. I am not a HUGE fan of hearts. They are cute and can be done well, but the over abundance of heart decor that comes out around Valentines day is a little overwhelming to me. So I am taking it in small doses. For instance, here is my kitchen table center piece:

I have taken 2 packages of hearts on sticks, red filler, white filler, and 2 kinds of ribbon (all except the white filler are from the Dollar Tree) and stuck them in my reclaimed, painted, and distressed wooden bowls. I made my little shutter tray from an old shutter I had lying around and just glued on some wooden drawer pulls as legs. The fabric is not even finished off yet. I threw it down to see how it would look and loved the out come. Maybe I can get it turned into an actual table runner before Valentine's Day. (Which by the way, it says "Be My Valentine" continuously on it in white.)

I also made, what I am calling, my "Love Tree". I took wooden hearts, from Hobby Lobby, and spray painted them. I wanted them white and it didn't seem to stick (here's a hint, don't spray paint on a windy day, the paint tends to blow away before it can stick to what you are painting) so I brought out the red but I wasn't loving it, so I tried the white again. I knew that mixing paint would change its colors, but I didn't know that layering spray paint after it dried would do the same thing. So now I have pink hearts. I wrote with a Sharpie the word Love on the big hearts and then parts of 1 Cor 13 on the others (i.e. is kind, is patient.....) then tied them on the tree.

I now have a daily reminder of what Love is...as if my son wasn't enough. I have a few more things to share, but I am not sold on my mantel just yet. It's either missing something or has too much, I haven't yet decided. When I get it right I will share that as well.