When we moved in, we knew the Fireplace was not what we had wanted. Just didn’t give us that country feel that is our style for our home. We had even talked of re-doing the fireplace and making it brick or stone, but with so many other projects that needed to get done, we decided to just put it on hold and hope to get a nice mantle to make it all come together. Pop came to me and said he would love to make us a mantle for our fire place. Of course we were OVERJOYED and excited that we would have a mantle that was super special made by him! Something we can have in the family forever. Pop, thank you sooo much for the mantle. I just love it! We all do! And in time for the fall and Christmas decor!!

Pop wouldn’t share with me any information about the mantle (looks, saying etc…) He kept joking about stuff and I just never really had a good feeling that he was even working on it! But he was (thankfully!) Mom called Brian one day at work and told him to get some pictures of Pop working on it. She totally knows me…. cause I love before and after and during pictures of projects… just for history 🙂 So Brian got a sneak peek before I did! We still are gonna brace it a little more and Pop is gonna put a satin finish on it, but its mostly done and you can see by the pictures that it looks just sooo perfect!!

I asked my mom to do a little write up on how the saying came about for the mantle since we had all thrown out so many ideas and thoughts.


THE MANTLE – Pop’s gift to the Krafts for their new home. October, 2009 By Mom Holladay

I had made a list for Pop of many sayings a month or so ago that might be good on Spring and Brian’s mantle. We misplaced the list. As time went on we just never could think of something. Pop kidded Spring he was going to put “All In Due Time” so she would have something to remember him by. But on the morning of Oct. 5 , 2009 I woke up with “Great Is Thy Faithfulness” on my mind. I asked the Lord “is this what you want on the mantle?” Do you think you could give me an indication that this is IT.? I thought for sure it would show up in my daily reading for that day, but it wasn’t there. So I proceeded to look up where that is found in scripture, it was Lam. 3:23. Then it came to me the mantle wasn’t really suppose to be done until the end of Oct. So I looked in my daily reading for Oct. 30 and sure enough there it was! It was clear to me that this was it. When I told Kenneth that morning he had thought of a different verse. So I said, “Oh, Okay”. Then I starting praying that if the Great Is Thy Faithfulness “verse is the one he wanted he would change Kenneth’s heart on the matter. Well, several days later I was at my desk and Kenneth said, “where is that verse?” I thought he was talking about a verse in Col. we had been talking about earlier in the morning. He said, “No I mean the one Great Is Thy Faithfulness.” He said he was on his way to Lin Thomas’s to have him do the lettering on the wood he had gotten in Ojai for the mantle. When he approached Lin, he was very happy to do it but said that things were pretty complicated around there and it might be awhile. I really was concerned it might be along while. So the next morning that was on my prayer list that that verse would minister to Lin as he carved it out and also that he might get it done soon. Well, Lin called Kenneth that afternoon and said he was finished with the lettering. Just to prove again, God is so faithful.
Kenneth then took it out to Piru on the Bradley Ranch to work on painting it and making the lettering stand out. He wanted it just right and had me come out to okay it just so he could get my approval. I thought it was beautiful. He, Brian and Otilio (our worker) put it up the next day, October 12, 2009.
Another God incident was at one of my Bible studies, I asked what the monthly hymn was for Heritage Valley Church. Each month they have a different hymn this month the hymn was “Great Is Thy Faithfulness”. What a “surprise” not really just a little frosting on the cake. J Thank you, Lord. Click this one to enlarge….

& for fun…. here is a BEFORE SHOT, before we even got the house! Can you see a difference!? 🙂

and here is more of the living room and entry way 🙂