$17 Mantle

I have the seven year itch. No, I'm not cheating on Mr.Dickey, but I am ready for a change. After seven years in our home I need something new. I dream about winning a contest that says they will give me $150,000 if I use it all on renovating my home. At night instead of counting sheep, I visualize the changes I would make.
Unfortunately, we don't have huge reserves of money. Sure we save, but when we have extra something always comes up. The things we need want to do cost money....lots of it. We try to do one "big" project every summer. This year we are building a shed.
This year our house will be fifty years old. Is it weird I want to have a party for it? I have made a list (okay more like a hundred) for smaller projects I want to start knocking out that won't cost a bundle. One thing on my list was to create a mantle for our living room fireplace.
When we moved in there was a gas insert that looked like a wood stove. One night four years ago we turned it on and my husband was pushed back by an explosion. Fire began shooting out the sides. I dashed for the bathroom and grabbed a wet towel and flung it on the flames. Nothing. We grabbed the kids and the dog and headed upstairs out of the house. I called 911 and the neighbor herded the kids into her home. The fire trucks were there in three minutes. The entire time I was imagining the basement engulfed in flames. In the end we were lucky the rocks around the fireplace saved our bacon. No damage was done. The firemen turned off the gas and we were told the insert was faulty. If  it had been a month earlier the Christmas decorations would have ignited and this would be a different entry.
The new insert was updated, but the fireplace looked blah.  I would love to have someone come in and build a custom mantle, but right now I have too many other fires going (haha). I like the stones, but they are jagged and would make it difficult to install a mantle flush to them.
Last spring I picked up some great iron brackets for $5. They were big. I had a night time vision of using them for a mantle. I hung them and added a $12  pine board I stained from Lowes. $17 mantle. Cheap update. I am excited to decorate it...a new vision for sleepless nights.

Opps. I guess I should have gotten a ladder out to stain the top of the board. Touch up needed! I am excited to incorporate our holiday decorations up here, but for now it is some of my random finds.