I had a very unusual wake up call in a way. My fireplace went out of control and the flames were blowing off to the side. My living room carpet almost caught on fire! After this incident happening I made a decision. I was going to get rid of this vintage fireplace and opt in for something a bit more safer. That would be an electric fireplace. I called the fireplace professionals in my area and had them completely seal off where the authentic fireplace was in my home first. Then after this I went out and invested in the electric fireplace. It cost about a little over one thousand dollars. But this was going to be very worth it. With the electric fireplace I would never again have to worry about flames going out of control and also, the electric fireplace works well for decoration at Christmas time. When I used to decorate my authentic fireplace, I would always have to be careful of putting things in certain places in risk of a flame catching onto it. But not anymore! My electric fireplace will give me free reign of everything around it. Also, this electric fireplace works great as a super powered space heater as well. When it comes to space heating, this electric fireplace can really warm up my entire living room in minutes much better than the authentic fireplace could. So all in all, an electric fireplace is the way to go these days if you want a fireplace in your home.