a porch and its yard

It's Easter! How many of you opted for a home cooked meal this holiday? The Fox and I did! We felt a little adventurous and decided to make an Easter meal for two.

The end result?

Oven roasted rack of lamb, roasted green beans, Barefoot Contessa's potato salad, Husk inspired cornbread, and my mama's deviled eggs. And if that weren't enough, we added ambrosia salad! It was delish and just what we needed after a productive weekend.

Our four-day weekend began with a lazy day. Good Friday was used to do a lot of lounging around. The weather was gorgeous so we ran, walked to lunch and enjoyed it with our windows open. On Saturday, we were a little less lazy and took advantage of Mother Nature's gift by diving into a curb appeal makeover.

It all started a few weekends back when we decided we wanted to paint the front porch of the Fox's house. The Fox had his color palette in mind, so off we went to Sherwin Williams. It was light blue for the ceiling and Charleston Green for the porch. We did it just in time as the pollen reared its ugly head the next day... Painting was a painless process and being a girl of instant gratification, was a project right up my alley.

Before, the Fox's front porch was tired and worn out.

The garnet was peeling off and the white ceiling had seen better days. A couple cans of liquid design magic later, we had a freshly painted porch!

It looks soooo much better! We had already replaced the light (see that here) and painted the front door (see that here), so the porch makeover just set it all off.

Of course we enjoyed some mid-afternoon snacks as well...

Anywho, after the painting was all said and done, the front yard was lacking just a wee bit. Not that it was really bad before, but in my opinion, it was just a blank canvas waiting for some design. Now, I'm no landscaper, but we talked it through and came up with a simple design that we hoped help to draw the eye to the showstopper, the front porch.

The before:

And after:

The top picture looks much more colorful due to the blooming azaleas and lighting, but you can tell that the new pine straw beds add so much more definition and character. Also, the red door pops so much more now that the porch is not the same color. And did we luck out! The neighbor down the road had just raked up her yard and she had a pile of pine straw on the side of the road! JACKPOT! We wheeled a few barrows full down to our yard and instantly had beds.

That was it! Our productive weekend complete. Unfortunately, it's back to work for me (not the Fox) tomorrow; then it's busy weekend April! I guess the next home project will have to wait until maybe the summer... stay tuned!

Happy Easter, everyone!