A Front Porch Update

Happy Cinco de Mayo! We’re having some hot days over here in the Northern California burbs. Spring, Summer and Fall are the seasons where it’s possible to extend your living space outdoors. These are the days where I can swap my desk, aka my trusty living room armchair, for a comfy chaise lounge outside instead. It’s pretty amazing, I try not to take it for granted. I feel very, very lucky, believe me!

Our backyard has some great spots to sit and relax, but I  can’t say the same for our front yard. We have a little porch area with a small patio right outside our front door, but it was wasted space.

It’s not very welcoming, I must say. It’s pretty neglected looking with a couple of forgotten potted plants and the skeletal remains of some long ago rock garden. So for the Lowe’s Creative Ideas May challenge we decided to tackle curb appeal.

Now, there’s a whole lot I’d like to do to the exterior of our home, but baby-steps right? First things first, we cleaned up the porch area and brought in some furniture and accessories, most of which we already owned.

We had all of these succulent pots in the backyard and thought that we’d share the love a little and bring ’em front and center instead. Same with the bench and the blue kwid-esque throw pillows. We also bought this great white ceramic stool to use as a small side table.

Our little bird bath from the backyard joined the party out front as well. Once we had her placed in the little patio area its was very apparent that, that little space needed some loving care as well.

The Mr, being the gardener he is, took it all on one morning while I was sleeping in. I woke up and opened the front door to a bare dirt patio. Needless to say, I was pretty surprised. We were originally just planning to work around the plants already in place, since they’ve probably been there for 20+ years at least. So it definitely was a big surprise. I wish I had remembered to snap a pic of the demolition phase 😉

The Mr had a great idea of turning this little area into an herb garden. I jumped on board 100% because who wouldn’t love having easy access to fresh herbs all day, everyday. The kitchen is very close to the front porch; the window overlooking the porch is actually the kitchen window. So all in all, it was a fabulous idea.

We reused some stepping stones from different areas in our yard and made a cute little curving path ending in the birdbath. Then we hit up our local Lowe’s and bought the following plants for our new herb garden:

 rosemary | sage | oregano | thyme | catmint
lavender | LAMBS EARS |  dill | chives | marjoram | CILANTRo
 PARSLEY | borage | 3 DIFFERENT KINDS OF BASIL

We found a pretty good sized rosemary bush, some Spanish Lavender and a catmint plant with pretty purple flowers.

We used three different kinds of basil plants: Green Basil, Thai Basil and Cinnamon Basil. A little Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme 😉 Ornamental blue sage as well as cooking sage.

We also used Creeping Thyme in between the stepping stones.

We couldn’t forget the Oregano, Dill, Marjoram and some Chives.

Oh and some Lambs Ears and Borage to add some texture and interest. In the blue pots on the porch are basil and thyme that the Mr started from seeds.

All in all, a pretty well-rounded herb selection, wouldn’t you say? I love how they all color-coordinate too! And we’ve already seen a couple of birds using the birdbath. So I’d say it’s pretty successful all around. This sure beats the old view I had from the kitchen window!