Southern Style Porch

I'm SO excited to have our front porch finished and checked off of our to-do list! I love, love, love the way it turned out! I don't really have any before pictures...but just picture a big empty porch! Our porch runs the full width of the house, with the front door in the middle. On one side of the porch, we put our freshly painted rocking chairs. On the other side, we decided to hang a porch swing!

My grandparents (Dad's side) had a swing on the back porch of their mountain cabin. I have great memories of swinging on the swing with them while chatting and watching the squirrels in the back yard and gazing at the mountains in the distance. When I saw our new house, I knew I wanted to put a swing on the porch, just like my grandparents used to have.

The swing is from Porchswings.com. We were going to order one from Lowe's or Home Depot (they both have a white swing for around $100), but they had a 300lb weight capacity...for a two-seater swing. I don't know about you, but that is completely unrealistic that a husband and wife's combined weight would only be 300lbs! Maybe they intended for an adult and child to sit on the swing? I don't know, but it just wasn't going to work for us.

I did some searching online and the only swings I could find were around $450-$600 for a larger weight capacity. Um, no. We didn't budget for that much moolah and we're way too cheap to pay that much anyway. After a little more searching, I found this swing that could hold our entire family's weight, plus some. It was listed at $159 with free shipping, but they had a special promotion going when I ordered, so I got it for $129 shipped! Score! It's a very well made, quality swing! Very happy with it!

My hubby and his dad hung it up while his parents were in town visiting. Way to make 'em work while on vacation right? Haha :) The instructions just say to drill a pilot hole into the rafters and then screw in the hardware to the ceiling. Of course, I wanted the swing hung diagonally, so it was a bit more difficult for them. Sorry guys! I'll get hubby on here to write a tutorial on how they hung it if anyone needs the info!

Here's our finished porch! The cushions are from Pier 1, I made the wreath, the flowers and pots are from Home Depot, and the rug is from Target. We've been enjoying the porch so much, especially now that the flowers are blooming out front. So pretty!

Linking up to Thrifty Decor Chick and East Coast Creative!