Nice. I hate them glued on coverings. But those are some cool plants for a buck-fifty. Euphorbia "firesticks", some kalanchoes, a grafted cactus, some aloes. Hard to get excited about jade plants (but maybe that's just me). Like the penguin though. Cheers.

Hmmm, isn't it funny, I put the pictures in when I was in Firefox & it shows both pictures full size, but I just opened up Mozilla & the 2nd is indeed a thumbnail, but it doesn't blow up in size when you click it. Doing something wrong, but I'm not sure what. Maybe something is going on with Photobucket, earlier it kept saying that my code was wrong when I tried to put it in the URL link. I'm glad the antlers aren't bothering anyone else, they didn't seem too obvious to me but I have a friend in particular who would probably spot it in a second :)If I come across something next year that I think may work I will give it a try. Thanks for your input!

Thanks, ladies! Les, I really appreciate your suggestions. I'll try some of them in the morning. But the mantle is only 9" wide...and the pheasant needs to rest on both its feet and it's tail tip, so wouldn't stand up on the stool. I did try the lamps further out at first, and they didn't seem right, but this was very quick, so I'll see how that looks. The plate stands require about 5" depth, and the lamp bases are 7", so I can't do much overlapping. The jar is chubby and 5" across, so can't be in front of the stool. I do agree about the leaves and berries, and I can't wait to get some. I'll cut some real bittersweet later, when it's ripening. It's just so yucky here tonight that I didn't want to venture out to get anything, but hope to tomorrow (well, actually today, now!) :-) The clock has been in that spot ever since I had the mantle made, so I'm just used to glancing at it there, but will try that move! The candle is in a small brass holder. I'll check to see what else I might have for it. This is stuff I just had in other areas of the LR, or stashed in the corner cupboard in there, so I didn't even leave the room to look elsewhere. How lazy is that? I'll be happy to take a pic of the heron print when the sun comes up. I'll never be able to capture the beautiful nuances of the outer mat, which is like suede. I have another heron print in there, too: and have them in the river out back, so they have meaning, too. annz, I just bought that pheasant last year locally! It's resin, (you'd never know!) and I had put a bit of Rub n Buff on that too, to highlight the feathers. I bought it at a local store called the Curtain Shop, where I was looking for fabric, and have never seen them anywhere else. They had a hen pheasant, too. Their # is 1-800-888-0663. Call them, and describe it and they will know what you're talking about.

I have to admit i wasn't quite as big a fan of tropicals until I'd moved to CA in the mid seventies , though I didn't have my own yard and just rented an apartment , but with all the walking I did , I was always taking in every new plant that caught my eye , growing just like any normal plant that might be growing it it's country of origin quite wild and after moving back to MI in the eighties I constantly felt I was missing so many tropicals I saw growing outdoors every day . I see one of several bird of paradise divisions does have a flower stalk already , so with any chance of sun , which can be rare here this time of year, it may actually grow to maturity and bloom for me . Has often been the case that the biggest oldest one , having been moved indoors in a somewhat dark hallway , would start sending up flower scapes and then they'd die before producing any blooms , due to the lack of proper light . Gro lites has helped in a few instances . I note my poor big spiral ginger has developed dead leaf tips on the leaders , where normally the biggest would be putting on flower scapes . Oh well, no blooms this year!