Birch Lane and Country Living Summer Home Tour

Welcome to part one of our summer home tour… If you are new here I’m Jen Migonis and my husband, AJ, and our two kids lives in Manchester-by-the-Sea, MA… the town really is just as charming as the name insinuates. AJ and I met on a blind date a little over eight years ago and it’s amazing to think of how we’ve grown together. We are both real estate agents and investors, and on top of that we apparently only buy houses with a project for ourselves. Without further ado…

We’ve been in this home for a little less than a year and it’s amazing to me how many things have changed in this first year. When we bought the home we knew we were purchasing good bones and that we would just need to put our beachy chic stamp on it. Many of the cosmetic updates were last done in the late 70s and early 80s so everything is completely liveable but not necessarily in our style. It’s funny how I thought I knew exactly what I wanted to do to this house when we moved in and then as we’ve lived here we’ve found out how we will really use the space and our vision has changed slightly. If you are new to the blog let me paint a picture of what this room looked like previously. Pink everything. Pink built-ins, pink walls, pink wallpaper, pink drapes. It was done so incredibly well quality-wise but it was not our style (you can see all the before photos in the house tour HERE).

The built-ins got painted with a coat of Hale Navy and the walls are Light French Gray by Sherwin-Williams. I added more blue, gray and tan accessories like the navy cable-knit pillows from Birch Lane, a striped pillow from Home Goods and some great throws from Wayfair, Restoration Hardware and Jo-Ann Fabrics. I love, even in summer, to have loads of throws around. Even though it’s officially summer now I’m still cuddled under one as I write this post.

One of my absolute favorite things about summer is that I can just clip flowers from our yard and bring them in… it’s amazing how simple fresh cut flowers can make a space feel so beautiful and enjoyable to be in.

Right after we took down the enormous Christmas tree from where the fireplace currently sits I started rearranging (why is it that every single January we get that ansty feeling to change our entire house around?!!). I brought the two couches that the previous owner left for us over here and brought in the fireplace from the office. Our goal was to create a sitting area in one end of the long area in the kitchen space. A jute rug and some brand new slipcovers from Freecycle have really helped make this space feel light, bright and comfy. I recently stocked up on pillow covers at Hobby Lobby’s 50% off sale, I depleted their selection but at $5 a pillow cover I couldn’t pass them up.

This space is included in our kitchen, it’s part of a long and somewhat awkward addition running nearly the length of the back of the house. When we redo the kitchen we will put dark hardwood floors in this space and install some French doors to the right of the coffee table so that this area flows into the dining room. Because we always find that whenever we have people over everyone always congregates in the kitchen we really wanted this space to be a part of the kitchen so that the guest and host never felt like they were missing out on anything.

Fireplace: Home Depot but we had to paint it (one I like even better HERE and it’s already white and inexpensive!)

Let’s move outside… directly through the sliders behind the white couch you’ll see this scene. A few months ago we added an outdoor seating area. It’s the perfect spot to escape to with a glass of wine and a good book… until the mosquitoes find me. We parked ourselves right here for Father’s Day breakfast and ate pancakes with way too many chocolate chips (oh wait, that’s not possible).

We recently added this pretty hydrangea bush to this spot. My vision for this backyard is to have many more like it… only larger so I can cut giant bouquets and no one will ever notice any are missing.

Pillows: Hobby Lobby | Throw: Jo-Ann Fabrics | Napkins: Pottery Barn | Napkin Rings: Pottery Barn | Juice Glasses, Glass Cake Stand: Second Hand

I’m so glad you joined me on part one of our home tour. I will finish the tour tomorrow as part of a Waterside Tour. Everyone participating lives on some sort of body of water so in addition to sharing a few more of the spaces in our home I’ll be sharing where we will be nearly every single day (beach!) this summer and my running route. It’s the kind of place that ends up in Runner’s World’s Rave Run column. 🙂

This post was sponsored by Birch Lane. I received a gift card as compensation for this post but all opinions are my own.

Here is the full line up of all the fabulous tours this week that are a part of the Birch Lane and Country Living tour: