House Update: The Exterior Wall

Hi Everyone! It's been a while since I posted about exterior progress on the house. I've been doing some toying around with paint colors which I hope to post about soon.  But most recently the big project was fixing our garden retaining wall. Our house sits up from the street and the there is a long stone wall on both street sides of the property.  The wall was in ok conditions in certain places and was completely falling apart in others. There was a large vine (think 4" diameter) coming out of the wall in one location.  We decided to go ahead and have the wall repaired so that we could plant in the bed between the fence and the wall come spring.  We also decided that the side entry to the house was way too narrow. Some people would walk past it and miss it altogether, so now was the time to widen it and make it more welcoming.  Here is what it looked like last fall before we cut down that awful vine.

Cutting it down improved it but then just revealed the damaged wall behind.

Here is some progress from when we built the fence and added our patio.

And here it is in progress.

As you can see, we also added a retaining wall next to the driveway (which allowed us to get rid of some rotting railroad ties and gives us space for planting). We also expanded the back patio space so our Airbnb has a little bit of outdoor space as well.  Here are some final shots of the wall and garden area (added a few shrubs which will screen the driveway nicely in the future).

 I'm excited to get fall cleanup started but sad that our planting season is coming to an end. Time to do some plant research and planning for next year! and finalize our exterior paint colors.

More thoughts on Exterior Paint Color

Hi Everyone! A while back when we were just in the process of buying our house, I wrote a post about possible exterior paint color choices.  Well, can you believe spring is right around the corner and it's time to think paint? In all actuality given the scope creep of other projects and additional things we want to accomplish around the house this year, we may not get around to paint, but this is one of those things I'm going to have to noodle on for a while and test out with swatches on the exterior, so it's good to keep it top of mind regardless. If you recall, we were thinking something like this:

I still like aspects of the color palette but am returning to the idea of something more neutral like a charcoal with hints of a dark aqua and light mint.  I also am thinking that I should keep the trim light. I love dark window frames but our storms are light and are not really very paintable so they just wouldn't work with a dark window.  Here is where I am at now. I also added in a simple picket fence to get an idea of what it would look like on our property (although we will most likely do something with a more interesting picket top to tie into the architecture of the house)

What do you guys think? Are we a little warmer?

DESIGN BLUEPRINT: Outdoors Style

Tis the season to pay more attention to your outdoor space than you normally would, and this little patio above is somewhere I could hang for a long time, chatting with friends and family.

 

Your outdoor living space should feel just as comfortable and welcoming as your indoor space. This means lot's of soft seating, textiles, and lighting for when the sun goes down.

DESIGN BLUEPRINT:

String Lights via World Market

Tea Light Holder via H&M Home

Scented Candles via H&M Home

Wood Tray via H&M Home

Pillows via Zinc Door: Solid / Pattern

Loveseat via CB2

Area Rug via Target

Pouf via West Elm

Throw via Lulu & Georgia

Blue Accent Table via Zinc Door

Inspiration Image via Style & Cheek

 

- Cori

CURATED NEST: Welcome Spring

Would it be jumping the gun to begin welcoming Spring? Whatever makes you feel good, right?

Let's start adding some greenery to our interiors to brighten things up. These fun ideas are a great place to start...

 

1. Copper Planter via Etsy

2. Bird Feeder via Snoku

3. Cat Planter via Etsy

4. Gold Dipped Pot via Dot & Bo

5. Watering Can via Lee West Objects

6. Foldable Pots via Pizzolorusso

Inspiration Image via  Laure Joliet

 

- Cori

 

The Front Yard and Porch

Now that we are in the depths of summer (although it's only getting up to 81 degrees here today), I thought I'd give you a little update on our summer plantings and front yard projects. We haven't done much since the mulch project and I haven't really done that much planting in the front except for the melons I planted in the spring. That said, it's been very impressive to watch them grow.  Here is what the area between the walkway and the driveway looked like when we were doing the mulch project.

As you can see, the watermelon plants had really just started to leaf out and there was a lot of bare dirt.  Well, here is what that area looks like now. They are really doing a great job acting as a ground cover.

I love how the purple plum I planted this spring along with the purple coral bells and barberry contrast with the yellow door. And the grasses are starting to frame the entry nicely as well.

Here are some of the melons up close. We have seven total so far (we harvested one but realized it wasn't ripe so we are waiting for these to get a bit bigger and hoping that Floopy the cat continues to fend off the squirrels).

On the other side of the yard we have some cantaloupes growing.

And earlier in the summer we hung a porch swing which my mother painted yellow to match our door. I got some fun bolster pillows for cheap from Target that add a bit of pattern and tie into the color of the swing, the blue ceiling and the black floor.

Lucy's favorite activity is sitting on the swing and looking over Puo-puo's shoulder at the hydrangeas that are starting to bloom.

How is your summer shaping up?

On to the outside

If you've been following along on the blog, you know that the inside of our house is mostly done (at least until we decide to do something major like finish the attic).  So I've been focusing on the outside - planting, dressing up our porch and deck etc.  Gardening is so therapeutic for me, all these projects have been so gratifying and fun. The first and largest project that happened in the spring was our gravel project.  I still owe the friends who helped us out big time!  Well, a couple weekends ago we embarked on another project, planting River Birch trees along our back fence and spreading out 9 cubic yards of mulch.  I have to give my brother and sister in law a big shout-out for helping and my parents for babysitting while we worked.  If you recall, here is what the back yard and gravel area looked like pre-mulch, and there are the birch trees in the driveway, ready to be planted.  That's our neighbor's yellow corvette which gives you an idea of how little privacy and screening we have.

And here is the pile 'o mulch in our driveway.  This time we learned our lesson and put a tarp down before the dump happened... much easier clean-up (and that's a sneak peek at my watermelon vines next to the walkway)

I wish I could say I got my perrenial shade garden planted around the gravel area but that will definitely be a multi-phase project over the course of a few years.  In the meantime at least the mulch makes it look neater and keeps the weeds at bay (although these photos make me realize that the back side of our garage and composters - and our neighbor's trash cans - look pretty dismal). 

I love how the River Birch add a lacy privacy screen to the back yard.  And look how our sunflowers from last year reseeded (Even though the seed packet said they were sterile)! 

I feel like the back yard is FINALLY turning into a space that feels planned and pretty.  Can't wait to show you more outdoor updates.  What projects are you taking on this summer?

A Backyard update

I get a serious case spring fever every year when the weather warms up and planting season arrives. All I want to do is go to the nursery, buy a bunch of plants and spend my day outdoors gardening (gardening to me is so much more cathartic than other DIY type projects like painting and sewing).  Being 10 months pregnant at this point has been a bit frustrating but I've managed to get a fair amount of gardening done and acted as foreman for one large hardscaping project. Last summer I showed you our back yard progress and what I was envisioning for it down the line. Here is what it looked like:

And my pipe dream.

I still like the idea of the arbor, the carriage lantern and painting the garage door.  But I have since changed my mind on the plantings and decided that instead of a monotonous row of evergreens, a few ornamental trees with plantings underneath will add enough privacy while providing more interest.  That will be a photoshop project for a future blog post. I was gearing up for these planting when Bryan started running back behind our garage into our rubble and poison ivy laden far back yard.  Here is what it looked like (from the real estate listing when we bought our house).

Tree planting then got put on hold and the aforementioned large hardscaping project ensued. The back area had to be cleared out and trees had to be trimmed and cut down (to let more light in and deter the poison ivy from growing back).  And since we were clearing out the back area, we had to move forward with the next step of putting down whatever we were going to put down since if we didn't everything would grow back as well.  If you follow me or Scott on instagram you would have seen this progression of photos (what you don't see is the ridiculous pile of gravel that Scott and our volunteer friends had to wheelbarrow from the front of the driveway to the very back of the yard). The nice thing is that despite the back breaking labor, the volunteers still seem to be friends with us and the toddler boys seemed to have really enjoyed rolling out the landscape cloth.

We used all the extra stone rubble we found to edge the "pool" of gravel and had some stepping stones donated by a neighbor.   What amazed us in the process was how large the space is we have back there.

Here are the stepping stones and what it looks like from the deck.

Next in what will undoubtedly be a multi-stage multi-year project will be planting a perennial shade garden around the "pool" (dogwoods, japanese maple, bleeding heart, hostas etc), adding a fire pit and maybe a picnic table and string lights..... and of course the trees for privacy along the fence.