A Front Porch Make Over

Is it really a make over if it had nothing on it to start with?

I've been wanting to do something with our front porch since we moved in last fall but really didn't know what I wanted to do. This summer we were in Target and I saw the cutest cafe set in turquoise and fell in love with it but we were just getting ready to go on vacation and it really would have been an impulse buy so I walked away.
When we got back from Florida I was once again in Target (no surprise there!) and guess what ~ they only had one cafe set left and it was ON SALE! Can I tell you how fast that set got into my shopping cart.

Richard and I put the set together ~ well he actually did most of it ~ and I loved the way it looked. Amazingly the next time I went to Target, they had some other outdoor chairs ~ also in turquoise and on sale ~ snapped three of those babies right up!
 Of course I wasn't satisfied there ~ I wanted some tables to put in between the chairs. We were at Home Depot and they were clearing out their summer furniture and they had some unpainted Adirondack tables ~ so that and a couple of cans of red paint for contrast to all the turquoise and we were in business.


Thanks again to my wonderful hubster for painting the tables for me.

 Oh, and they also had citronella candles in turquoise buckets!  Can you see a pattern here?   

 A few final touches of the red checkered table cloth I made. The two butterflies on sale at 70% off at Jo-Anns and the adorable frog candle from Pier One ~ and we LOVE our front porch! I can't tell you how many evenings or afternoons we sit out and enjoy the cooling weather. Oh, and we also put an additional bird feeder up in one of the trees, which has been bringing some fun visitors to watch. Oh, and believe it or not ~ two flowering plants that I have managed to keep alive for a few months now which is a record for me for sure. I was born with a black thumb.
 Last weekend we were sitting out on the porch and a beautiful little hummingbird showed up, checking on the flowers in the hanging pots. I was so stunned and I was afraid to breath and scare him off.

We've since put up a seed bird feeder and a hummingbird feeder in the backyard and have been doing lots of work back there. Still lots of work to come though. We have about 5 pine trees that Richard has now removed the lower branches from so we can walk through that area. We have tons of flowering bushes of all kinds. I've cut those all way back to give them room to grow again in the spring.

Never thought I'd love working outside so much but I sure do these days. Who knows, maybe we'll even attempt to grow some tomatoes or something next year! Miracles happen all the time right? So anyways ~ come on over for a visit sometime. We can sit outside and watch all the birds come and go. Better hurry though, while the weather is still nice. I hear we are in for a cold cold winter!