Independence Day - grace grits and gardening

Last week I shared a few easy ways to decorate your house and garden for the 4th of July. If you missed it, click HERE. Today, I’m focusing on the porch. A patriotic porch extends summer’s favorite celebration beyond the inside of your home.

We are lucky to have three porches—a front wraparound porch, a back screened porch, and a sleeping porch upstairs. First up, the front porch.

It sort of goes without saying (but I’ll say it anyway), plant red flowers. The good news about summer gardening, often when the weather turns blistering, you can find plants on sale. I found red petunias and salvia for fifty cents at Lowes! Yes, you may have to trim/water/coddle/deadhead them, and yes, they are a little leggy, but $0.50!! They make great fillers for the bare spots in my containers along the front.

What’s easier than poking a dime store flag in a flower pot? Not much. Even though our chair cushions aren’t patriotic, the vintage star pillow pulls everything together like the cherry on top of a sundae.

Raid your house and temporarily relocate red, white, and blue decorations from inside to outside for a 4th of July porch party. Red striped and denim pillows on the swing plus a child’s little red wooden bench add patriotic touches.

Throw a vintage tablecloth on your outdoor table. The colander I ate strawberries from last week, now holds a fern.

Now on to the back porch.

By moving things around and rummaging through my garage, I was able to give my back porch a patriotic look. The bowling pins were a long ago yard sale find. Everything else was either already on the porch, in another room, or being unused in the garage. When we moved from Dallas, the red-stained bookcase didn’t fit in our new house, so we put it on the back porch to use as a potting bench / serving buffet. Works great! Since it’s in a protected area, the only problem with having it on the porch is dust and pollen.

Razorbacks are naturally patriotic:)) #WPS!

And last, our sleeping porch. Obviously, this ain’t no P. Allen Smith sleeping porch. His is to die for. Ours is dusty with an inch of pollen on the floor and no place to sleep. But since the sleeping porch is a part of early 20th century American architecture (and since I mentioned it), I thought I should show ours to you. I do love the vintage motel-style chairs which came from 410 Vintage. And my Easy Peasy Breezy Vintage Hanky Bunting is being showcased in the name of summer. What I really want out there is an antique bed of some sort…