Early Summer Backyard Tour

Happy Memorial Day! I hope that you are enjoying the day with family and friends, and taking time to remember and reflect on those who have served our country.

I was invited to join a fab group of bloggers who are opening our doors {or gates} this week for summer home tours. A couple of months ago I showed you how I decorate indoors for spring and summer, so I thought that this was a perfect opportunity to show you some summer updates in our backyard. {You’ll find links to all of the other summer home tours at the end of the post!}

The weather has been a bit spotty lately, but we finally got a little reprieve this weekend which gave us a chance to get the backyard ready for summer. I have lots of pictures to show you, but you may also be interested in these posts from last year:

Living in the an urban neighborhood equals a small yard, but we’ve been working really hard to make the very most of our limited space. Soon after moving in, we turned the space between the house and our detached garage into a large patio, perfect for entertaining.

This patio has always had some pops of color, but this year I really wanted to create a more inviting and warm space. My goal was to turn our patio into more of an our door living room. That meant bringing in an outdoor rug, some new pillows with pops of pink, and even a couple of side tables.

The couch and chairs we purchased soon after moving in {even before we had a patio to put them on}. The furniture itself has held up great, but the beige cushions got shredded in an unexpected hailstorm late last summer. I should have taken the cushions to be recovered over the winter, but it totally slipped my mind.

Rather than dropping them off now and being without them for most of the summer, I came up with an inexpensive, temporary fix that I think looks pretty darn good . Then, when fall rolls around I’ll take the cushions in for a real re-upholstery job – or maybe I won’t even need to. Take a look at my no-sew trick for recovering outdoor cushions.

This post contains affiliate links. If you buy something that I recommend, you pay the same price, but I may receive a small commission.

I just love the pops of pink that the floral pillows add, but it’s the Ikat outdoor rug that really pulls the space together. The rug comes in one size larger, which would have probably been a better scale, but I was trying to update the patio on a budget, so the cheaper, smaller rug won out.

I added a navy blue metal plant stand as a side table on either end of the couch. I adore the color and shape of the plant stands, and I just love the battery operated candle lantern that I placed on each. But best of all, these side tables can also be moved around and provide extra seating when we are entertaining a bigger group.

Behind the couch is our al fresco dining area. We’ve had the table {from Target} for many years and it’s held up great, but the coordinating chairs weren’t fairing as well, so we replaced them with these gorgeous teal seats from JC Penney a couple of years ago.

The wall of the garage is one giant sea of white stucco, so in an effort to give that space some style and function, we added the planter bench that serves as seating on one side of our dining table. Deciding what to plant in the bench proved a hard decision. We first envisioned grasses, but soon realized that soft, tall grasses are very floppy and would quickly overtake the bench, whereas tall, stiff grasses and very pokey and wouldn’t be comfortable to sit in front of.

Backyard planter bench dining table seating

We finally happened upon the perfect plant – Elegant Feather. It grows very tall and straight, but is incredibly soft, making it perfect for the bench. After buying it at our local nursery for years, it’s become hard for us to find locally the last couple of summers. This year, I ordered it online to save all the running around, and we got it planted just a couple of days ago. It’s still very tiny, but give it a month or two and it will look like this… {which is a photo from a few summers ago}

I’ve always wanted a large piece of art on the wall above the bench, so this year I ordered a 30×40 canvas print of a photo we took while traveling through the winelands of Cape Town, South Africa a couple of years ago. I’ve tested out a method to make this canvas waterproof so it can hold up to the elements of the summer, and I’ll share the tutorial with you as soon as I’ve had a little more time to ensure it holds up the way I hope it will.

I originally planned to print a photo from our honeymoon in Greece for this space on the garage wall… the same photo I showed you last week that inspired the color palette for the patio decor…

vacation photo color palette inspiration

But when I envisioned what it would look like as the elegant feather gets taller and begins to overlap the bottom of the canvas, I thought the green rows of grapevines would make for a more natural transition between the plants and the art on the garage wall.

The kids, of course, always play a very important role in every space that we design in {and out of} our home. We’ve given the kids their very own table and chairs for entertaining their own mini-dinner guests {I need to restain it, but the rain barely stopped in time for me to take photos, so the staining didn’t get done quite yet}.

Since the boys spend so much time cooking in their kid-sized kitchen located in our kitchen, we decided that this summer they also needed their very own kid-sized BBQ so they can keep dad company as he grills.

The fireplace that you see there is actually a look through that is open to our kitchen as well. It doesn’t effectively heat a very large area of patio, but it is nice to take the chill off on cold evenings like we’ve been having lately!

Back to the kids… we also surprised them with a very big new addition to the backyard this past week, which they are affectionately calling their “big brown house.”

Backyard inspiration for adults and kids

Our yard is fairly small, but thanks the retaining wall we had built last year to level the side of the yard, we were able to create a pretty good play space for the boys along the side of the garage.

That wood screen does a good job of hiding the air conditioning unit just to the right of the garage, and the small pergola {or is it an arbor?} creates a nice transition into the boys play space.

Of course, the boys find plenty of other places to play in the yard as well. Mom and Dad love listening to the gentle sound of the water fountain…

…while the boys enjoy splashing around in the fountain with their pirates.

What haven’t I talked about yet? Oh, let me give you a closer up look at my table setting…

Have I mentioned lately how much I love that “dollar” section at the front of Target {now called Bullseye’s Playground}?! LOVE! All of these plates and the bright pink candle hurricanes all came from that bargain spot. I picked up the stemless outdoor wine glasses for a great deal at Target as well.

One of my favorite views of the backyard is the bird’s eye view that you get looking down from our third floor patio.

And I can’t wrap up this summer backyard tour without talking about my favorite element… the string lights! To fully appreciate those, you need them see them at dusk…

patio with string lights between house and garage

I just love the way the lights glow against the deep blue sky!

If string lights are on your backyard wish list, you’re in luck. I’ve got a detailed string light tutorial that will walk you through everything you need to know. From choosing between standard grade and commercial grade lights, calculating maximum run wattage, and installing guide wires.

Install string lights between house and detached garage

Thanks to our string lights, we can continue to enjoy the backyard long after the sun has gone down!

I hope you’ve enjoyed the tour of our newly improved backyard “living room.” If you missed my spring home tour in March, you may want to take a peek inside! I added lots of flowers and pops of pink, and that cheery and bright decor will be sticking around throughout the summer!