Home Is Where The Projects Are!

We all got home styling fever during lockdown, there wasn’t a lot to do and I’m sure the vast majority of us took to at least one room with a paintbrush to change it up, freshen the style and make things work a little better. We did too of course and though I hate decorating we managed to make great inroads to making our house more of a home by way of aesthetics and it’s something I’ve not stopped doing. I mean, it’s all an on-going saga anyway isn’t it, especially when you have kids. Like the laundry, you get to the end of it and then realise, before you’ve even been able to really enjoy that moment, that you’re back at the beginning again and it all needs doing again.

I’m currently on the eldest’s new bedroom and when she’s in that it’ll be tackling her old one to accommodate her baby sister (well, her baby sister’s clothes as let’s face it, I don’t think she’ll be sleeping in there for some time judging by my other children) and so on and so on and so on. It really is lovely when you get to the end of a project though and I’ve enjoyed lots of things we’ve done around the home to make ours that little bit more comfortable and pretty. Often it’s just been the upcycling of a piece of furniture (hello dining chairs and also Jimmy’s old little wooden desk) which have simply needed a lick of paint (I love spray paint because it goes on so smoothly) and other times we’ve taken on bigger projects like reflooring, ourselves (and by “ourselves” I mean Jonny) a whole room or tackling our once very boring garden which is now coming along very nicely!

When it came to our garden we wanted it to be an extension of the house as, after all, it is an extra room in the summer (if we ever get the weather) and with our garden room having bi-fold doors it really is a way of bringing our outdoor space in and vice versa. Our garden was quite boring before but slowly we are creating somewhere really nice to sit with a decked area, some patio, lawn and this sort of stoney beach feel around one side which is where my lush home made (out of pallets) Tiki Bar sits. Come on sunshine, we need you to really take advantage of that one please!

One thing we’d like to add to the garden now would be a pond but we don’t really have room; so because I like lots of little areas we thought a fish area rather than a pond might be a really good idea – stay with me, I know what I mean so I’ll explain. A pond and a fish tank all rolled into one is in my mind’s eye inspired by the fish we always visit at the garden centre on our way out of Gymboree. Raffie has always been obsessed with them and it’s almost like a brilliant sensory play for him now, we can’t get out of the shop because he likes to stay and watch them so much but if we had our own… So how do you get a fish tank for the garden which is kind of like a pond you ask? Well… High quality glass for outdoor ponds is required and you can build your own. Like this:

Now if you’re building a koi pond you will need the right pond glass which Tuffx Glass can advise you on. They can provide glass for covers and screens so though we might not be able to squeeze such a beauty as the picture shows above into our much smaller garden than this would allow, we could bespoke order something which would sit perfectly to the side of perhaps our bar area! That would make the whole feel even more unusual and make a really interesting feature, something maybe like the picture below!

Only I’d like it to be quite high up, still within eye level of the littles but more of a piece of art as well as a fish tank and pond. I’d go for black stone work around the glass and make the fish really pop as you look at them swimming by and I don’t know anyone who has something similar so it’d be a real coup. Now that beats any other garden accoutrement I’ve seen lately? We’d have to not BBQ any fish within eye shot of our new friends of course but we could certainly enjoy evenings eating al fresco with a lovely back drop don’t you think?

We’ve lots to do for the home and garden but this idea is firmly on my Pinterest board now along with the hanging egg chair and projector to watch movies while we cuddle up on loungers under blankets as the stars come out. The home really is where the projects are!

Collaboration.