The TV Mommy

Maybe it’s the pandemic. Maybe it’s because I’m home so much late now with the kids. Probably it’s a combination of both. Whatever the reason I find myself doing more and more DIY projects around the house.

It started last spring with our kitchen table. I needed something to keep the hubby busy during his brief quarantine layoff. I’d been wanting to either get a new table or update ours since it didn’t really match anything in the kitchen. Over the course of a couple weeks we stripped it, painted it, and stained it. It came out exactly as I hoped.

In the summer we updated the front of the house, pulling out old ugly bushes and adding planter boxes my handy husband made. I think I need to set up an Etsy shop for his woodworking skill because I had a few neighbors asking where we got them.

With the possibility of another quarantine and shut down always looming, I starting getting ideas for my/our next home project to tackle.

It looks some convincing (on his part not mine) but this winter we repainted our kitchen, dining room, and living room. It’s been a project on my to do list since we moved in 8 years ago.

With spring and summer looming I wanted to do something to update the backyard. After last year I know I’ll be spending a majority of my days with the kids outside and wanted a comfy and fun spot to watch them play.

For a few months I’d been eyeing up some cafe patio lighting after coming across the idea on Pinterest.

I have to admit for my husband not being 100% on board with the idea, he dove right into the project with me as soon as I showed him the idea. We headed to the hardware store and lumber yard the next day to get supplies.

I chose some square wood boxes to make the planter boxes. They were white originally so I painted them with a matte black paint.

The posts are 4x4x8 cedar posts that we stained to match the flower boxes in the front yard.

After painting the flower pots and staining the beams we poured the cement. If you try this out for yourself make sure you place the flower pots where you’d like them to end up before you do this step since they will be very heavy to move afterwards.

The cafe lights are actually solar. I found them at Costco and are great since I don’t have to worry about running an electrical cord to our outlet on the deck. The light should get ample amounts of sun every day since our patio is on the west side of our house and gets lots of sunshine. There is also the bonus of an on/off switch if you don’t wan the lights on and want to stargaze instead.

Finally we attached hardware to the poles to hold lights and then strung them between the poles and the back of our deck.

Before planting the flowers we drilled holes into the planters to help with water drainage.

Overall I’m so happy with how this project turned out. It was relatively easy, inexpensive, and didn’t take long (although we had a wait a few days due to rain and pouring the cement and until the frost/freeze stopped at night to plant the flowers). Even the hubby admits he likes how it turned out.

Now on to the next project!