Fire and Ice (and Christmas Lights)

Hey Everyone! How’s your week going? We spent this past weekend (well, actually all last week)… on vacation! Surprise! We stole away to the Bethany/Rehoboth Beach, DE area for a few days and it was the best vacation ever. Plenty of relaxing, adventuring, and even a bit of homey stuff (aka. I was drooling all over all the beachy decor options, wishing we had a beach house to decorate). More on that later this week (I hope- if I can get my act together and upload the pictures/videos), but for now I’m here with a few quick patio updates for ya. As you may remember, this is what it’s been looking like these days:

Actually, “updates” might not be the best term for today’s post… rather this is a closer look at a few things that we already had, but I never took the time to highlight. The first being the table that you can see better in this photo:

Remember our Thomas House Rules? We roll out the red carpet for pieces that can do more than one thing. Double functioning, you say? Come on in. And this is no different… at first glance the table looks like a regular square coffee table, but there is more than meets the eye to this baby. Table by day…

…and fireplace by night!

We got this fireplace/table situation last fall, after our wedding. It had been something on our registry that was not gifted to us, but we knew we’d get tons of use out of it so we went ahead and got it for ourselves after the fact. I wanted to wait until we had a full season to really use it before I recommended it to anyone. Before we get into what we like/don’t like, here is the actual product:

The Leisurelife 4-in-1… so you already saw two of the four features in action (table and fire pit). This piece is super versatile because it can also be a cooler for drinks:

And a grill for cooking:

Needless to say, it definitely fits our multi-functioning rule and it has been the perfect size (petite, but big enough for a decent sized fire) for our compact patio. All in all, a HUGE win for us. Now let’s get to the pros and cons (keeping in mind that it has been in use for a full season now).

Pros:

• Easy to assemble
• Frame has held up to all sorts of weather (rain, snow, etc.)
• Comes with lots of “extras”: cover, fire poker (self-proclaimed technical term), grill insert, smaller grill insert for wood, metal mesh “lid”
• Great size- not too big, not too small
• Durable fire pit insert (this is what we use it most for and it has held up wonderfully)
• Ascetically pleasing (dark/neutral design works well for outside)
• Lots of bang for the buck- I mean, it can do four flippin’ things for crying out loud!

Cons:

• The tiles are not secured into the frame by any glue, adhesive, etc. (We are super careful not to hold the lid or tilt the table at an angle that the tiles could fall out and break)
• Smaller grill and fire poker have rusted (but we attribute that to having to leave them out in the rain due to lack of indoor storage)
• The cover ripped (but this could have been operator error- some water froze on it this winter and we tried to take the cover off without letting it thaw first)

So, would I recommend this to anyone? YES, totally. Oh, and by the way, I’m not getting any perks or reimbursement from Target to say/write this… we have just really enjoyed the piece and wanted to share with anyone who might be in the market for something similar. It has provided us with hour after hour of cozy conversation space, s’more roasting, and game playing.

Would I buy it again? Yep. For our needs and space, a mobile, multi- functioning piece has fit the bill perfectly.

So that’s the fire and ice part of the post title. The Christmas lights? Well, that’s pretty self explanatory. We just grabbed a few white light, green wired sets (we had TONS left over from the wedding) and swagged them across each of the fences. They are plugged into an electrical outlet by the door.

At one point there was some talk about trading the fence lights in for a bigger bulb-ed version like this one from Target- this might happen down the line, but for now these guys are doing the job just fine. For the tree, we decided against draping them on the outside because we didn’t want our neighbors to have to look at a large glowing blob of lights every night. Instead, we wove them in and out of the branches on the inside, snaking them up as far as we could get them. The effect has been (I’m sorry, but as corny as this is, there’s just no other word for it)… magical.

Looks like fairies, right?! We keep the tree limbed up pretty far so that people can walk underneath and sit under and around it. It has been great because even though there’s a tree on our property, it doesn’t take away any “living area” space. In face, it’s become a great umbrella and an even greater cozy nook when it’s all lit up. And yes, we are very careful with the fire/tree situation. We never have the fire underneath or even close to branches, never let the flame get too high, and we’re always outside or right in the kitchen when the fire is on.

So that’s the scoop on some of our unsung patio heroes! See you later!

-Leslie