Summer Home Tour 2021: Seasonal Simplicity Series

Welcome! I am happy to invite you in for a little peak around our home this summer. It’s gotten hot and sticky over the last few days here in Alabama. After what I felt like was the most lovely spring weather, summer has crept in and is likely to be here for a while.

I am thrilled to be joining 23 other home decor bloggers to share simple summer touches around our homes. Each season we open our doors and hope you feel inspired when you hop on over the next home. If you are arriving here from Danielle’s lovely home at Finding Silver Pennies, come on in. But first I need to thank our host, Krista from The Happy Housie for bringing us all together for this series.

The Dining Room

After the foyer the next space you enter is the dining area. It is actually part of a large vaulted open room with our living room.

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From Apt2b: Kimbrough dresser from Apt2B,  Veles Table lamps in Andesine, Tiffany Mirror

Like this spring, I foraged for tall branches for the dining room table. I love the height real tree branches offer instead of faux stems which tend not to be over a certain height and feel small here.

We gather here for our evening meal and I just push the vase down to one side of the table while we eat. It’s regularly just three of us here daily. I don’t like decorating our home in a way that is fussy or hard to maintain. It will be interesting to see how long these branches last. The spring branches looked great for several weeks.

The Living Room

Honestly, there were only minimal changes in here since this spring. The main focus of restyling the room for summer focused on the mantel.

I shuffled a few things around on the coffee table and brought in more blue and white.

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The pillows I have on the sofa were custom made for the room during the One Room Challenge last spring, so I don’t swap them out until I’m in the mood for a darker, moodier palette in the fall.

I have always been found of the look of a fern in the fireplace for the summer. I finally have a home where I just might be able to keep it alive in there. I tucked in some of my larger blue and white porcelain pieces next to it on the marble of the hearth.

Like I said in our Mantel hop last week, my approach to this season’s mantel definitely fell decidedly in the maximalist design style. Even though I love collections of all kinds I try to show a bit of restraint in my decorating, but I’m kind of loving this right now.

Summer in the Kitchen

While I the design press are trying to tell us people are not enjoying open spaces like they once did before the pandemic, I still really love the way our home is designed.

The kitchen is tucked of to the side, but still open enough to feel connected.

To me summer means wild flowers, fresh cut blooms from the garden and summer fruits like my favorite, Chilton County peaches.

Our summer tour this year fell just a week too early for my White Wedding Hydrangeas. The bushes are covered in buds, but only a few are just starting to blossom.

The arrangement you see here are a combination of sunflowers from my local grocery store, wild flowers from the field near my house and Queen Anne’s lace from the hillside leading to the lake behind our house. I wanted it to feel as organic and as collected, just as it was.

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Before you go, let me just set the record straight. My house does not at all look what you see here in these images. If you were to actually show up at my doorstep, this is not what you would see, except maybe the kitchen. I can take a mess everywhere else but the kitchen needs to be neat and tidy or my stress level rises.

We are deep in the throws of the One Room Challenge, where we are making over our main bedroom in 8 weeks. So, over the last two weeks, I have cleaned and straightened each area to photograph and then moved all the furniture and miscellaneous stuff that has been displaced from our bedroom around the house.

If you want to hear more about what I’m up to with this makeover, be sure to subscribe to the blog for weekly updates here and follow me on Instagram and Facebook. I share the real-life look of renovation and DIY there!

Thank you for stopping in today for this neat and tidy version of my summer-styled home. Next stop is Nina Hendrick’s lovely colonial home.

This week I’m joining some of my talented blogging friends for the Summer Seasonal Simplicity Home Tour Series! Each day from Monday through Thursday six bloggers are sharing part of their homes all ready for summer. Be sure to enjoy all of the beautiful inspiration for adding a little summer to your home by visiting the links under the images below.

Sharing with me today…

Tuesday

Cassie Bustamante // Finding Silver Pennies // Deeply Southern Home

Nina Hendrick // Maison de Cinq // Clean & Scentsible

And sharing the rest of this week…

Monday

The Happy Housie // Inspiration for Moms // She Gave it a Go

Home Made Lovely // A Pop of Pretty // Life is a Party

Wednesday

A Pretty Life // My Sweet Savannah // Fynes Designs

House by Hoff // Lemon Thistle // Dans le Lakehouse

Thursday

Life is Better at Home // Rambling Renovators // Hallstrom Home

Craftberry Bush // JoAnna Anastasia // Willow Street Interiors