October 19, 2015

Dream Porch Makeover- Part One

A little hint at what my porch dreams are made of…

Our current back porch…

For more on our back porch seen above, Read “Back Porch Overhaul 4.0“

Okay, don’t get me wrong.  I love it.  I do.  But I have to admit that it’s more of a “make do with what you’ve got” space than a space that’s true to me and my style.  It was kind of a last minute “throw everything from our previous porch and pool area onto the porch and make it all work” moment.  And we made it pretty beautiful and have enjoyed it for almost two years now.

The time has finally come though for a big ol’ Addison’s Wonderland refresh with the help of my friends at Vintage Porch Swings in Charleston, South Carolina.  When you think of beautiful Southern porches, Charleston is one of the first areas that comes to mind.  My husband and I absolutely adore Historic Charleston and have always dreamed of moving there one day.  The long, tall colorful homes with huge welcoming front porches are just beaming with Southern charm.  Seeing as though we live in the country AND are in the South, I wanted to bring this same dreamy “Southern Living” style to our home as well.  I can see it now…  Mark and I enjoying a glass of wine on the swing while our girls run through the wide open field giggling with sundresses on and long flowing hair…  Okay just admit it, you saw it too and now you are imaging where you’d put one!  Here are some examples of their amazing porch swings so you can get an idea of my vision…

Vintage Porch Swings

Hayden Porch Swing

Emerson Porch Swing

Wowzers, right?!?  I took one look at some of these images and my heart was set on having one in our home.  And I knew just the place!  So after pondering over all of the beautiful styles, I chose this one…

Noah Porch Swing

It arrived at our home a couple of weeks ago and this past weekend we decided it was time for Project Back Porch to begin!  The swing was packaged with perfection and included pretty much everything needed for the installation.  Mark was super impressed because he was assuming he’d need a visit to our local Home Depot but all he needed was a drill and a wrench.

Step One

So first up, unpackage the swing.  With a little help from a cute little three year old…

Step Two

Attach the sides and base using included screws…

Step Three

Attach the mattress base using included pre-cut 1 x 4’s.  Mark used one 1 x 4 as a spacer between each one removing it as he went…

Step Four

Secure included eye-hooks into studs in the ceiling with spacing specified for the swing in the instruction kit.  Our spacing was 8′ wide and 4′ deep…

Mark pre-drilled the holes into the studs before securing the eye-hooks…

He then used a wrench to tighten the hooks…

And unfortunately this is where our project progress abruptly halted for the day…  If you follow me on social media you may have seen that we had a wee bit of a mis-hap over the weekend.  A wee-bit might be a tad of an understatement…

First and foremost, I absolutely DO NOT want to take away from the amazingness of the porch swing.  This could have happened anywhere, at any time and on ANY home project.  I always try and maintain a little “reality” in a world of social media perfection and this is just that.  Proof that even after fourteen years and six homes of house projects, we are not professionals and DIY safety is hugely important!

So what happened?  Well, Mark was on Step Four of the process and was securing the eye-hooks with a rather large and heavy wrench.  He was applying a large amount of pressure because it was the last turn and he was making sure it was nice and tight.  I was standing a little too close taking pictures and THANK GOODNESS was looking down at the moment.  I honestly don’t remember it slipping from his hand, I don’t remember it hitting my head and the crazy part is that I didn’t even feel it.  The next thing I remember is (okay, if you are squeamish scroll down to Step Five) putting my hand on my head and my two fingers literally went inside of my head and I realized that I was bleeding profusely and I said “Oh my God, there’s a hole in my head”.  Thank heavens my sister-in-law was there to stay with our little ones and after going back and forth about calling 9-1-1, Mark rushed me to his truck and drove about 90 to the ER.  Once there, they rushed me back and long story short… gave me three shots of Novocaine (ouch!) in the top of my head and three staples to secure my head back together (big ouch!).  I’m not going to lie  It hurt pretty bad and the now day three headache hurts even worse.  I am on the mend though and I am SO incredibly thankful and blessed that it was not any worse, that it wasn’t one of my little ones and that God was watching over me in that moment.  Let’s just sum it up and say we are now much more cautious and careful with tools and projects from this point forward.  Lesson learned!

Okay, so day two and Mark was determined to get this project finished up!

Step Five

Cut the included rope in half, one for each side…

Step Six

Thread the rope through each eye-hook on both of the short sides making sure it is even at both hanging ends…

Daddy’s little helper… dressed in PJ’s and covered in paint from our pumpkin painting project!

Step Seven

Form a Figure-8 knot at the bottom of each rope end once it’s threaded through the hole in the swing base…

Step Eight

Apply pressure evenly to each side to tighten the knot and level the swing…

Mark was so proud of his mad leveling skills that he insisted I take a picture…

Step Nine

Enjoy!

And I have to be 100% honest and say that injury and all, we absolutely LOOOOVE our new swing!  I ended up hanging out on it most of the afternoon on Sunday and the slight swinging motion is literally hypnotic.  Mark even said “I have to admit, this is pretty awesome!”

My porch project is far from complete and I can’t WAIT to finish up the swing with upholstery, bolsters and more.  I am actually headed to Anthropologie tomorrow to pick up these A-MAZING chairs for our dining area too…

Sari Rattan Chairs (I am getting the Holly color)

To Be Continued… (On Monday, 11/02!)

XOXO, Brittany Hayes