Unfortunately, the knobs you bought are too small to make any impact. Do you want brushed nickel or could you use another color? Is there a light fixture in the hallway? Or a runner? What style is your house?

This would be a great spot to do some fun/funky knobs! You could even pick a theme and do all different knobs. Anthropologie has some fun knobs.
https://www.anthropologie.com/hardware

Since you are on a lake ... is your DH into fishing? You could do an assortment of fish themed knobs.
https://www.knobs4less.com/Novelty-Fish-Collection/fishcollection.html

Life is too short for tiny boring knobs! :-)

Way too small. Those would work much larger. Some good sellers are listed above. I like the idea of the chrome, just something you can actually see and use.

It looks like a regular boring hallway, so it could use some craziness :-)

How much smaller are they than the current knobs? It may not matter if they stand out enough to make a statement.