My Mantle Decor

Every few years I get a bug to rearrange my rooms...I think it comes from being in one place for over 5 years, after moving at least once a year for the 15 or so years before.
I usually don't buy much, but simply rearrange or pull out stuff that I've had stored away or even repaint & make old things new :)
Here's what I've done lately:
My mantle- I love my mantle at Christmas and have a huge Nativity set with garland and lights and sparkle and it fills it up! After Christmas I put a few family photos there and wasn't very pleased. SO, I gathered MORE and more photos!! I put them in similar frames and still wasn't happy. I remembered a gift a friend had given me a few years before- a cute photo holder that read FAMILY. Perfect! Except for the fact that it was typical brown shiny finished and didn't have much character. So, I painted and distressed it. So much better!
Add a vase, some twigs...wait, it's unbalanced...sigh!
So I found an old picture frame I've held onto for years and turned it on its side for height and balanced the mantle decor out. BUT... It looked weird.
A very nice lady gave me a wicker heart that had been painted baby blue (I have nearly no blue in my home...) so I painted it a color I liked and tied a scrap of muslin on it and hung it from the frame. Then I stepped back and looked....the fabric was too white! So down the heart came and off came the fabric. I put the fabric in a cup of hot tea and let it sit for an hour or so til I liked the color. I let it dry and put the heart back up and I love it now :D