When I say garden party what I really mean is BBQ season. With it comes the chance to spend more time outdoors with friends and family. It’s also a good excuse to spend the evening sipping on gin cocktails and eating good food.
We’re currently experiencing mornings of beautiful blue skies and bitter cold evenings here in Sheffield. However, we’re already in the middle of April and it won’t be long ’til summer arrives. I’m looking forward getting some warmer and more consistent sunshine.
To host a fun and relaxing garden party you need to hope for dry weather, ensure your garden is looking good and is child friendly and of course, have a BBQ ready to fire up.
5 tips to prepare your garden for summer parties
Tackle the garden
You don’t need to do a lot but spend a little time in the garden and make sure it’s looking on point for your guests. It’s also nice to do for yourself, you’re more likely to spend time having breakfast and dinner in the garden if it’s clean and tidy.
Get started by digging up weeds, prune shrubs, mow and fertilise the lawn and finally, create a neat finish to your lawn with a strimmer. SGS Engineering have all the garden tools you’ll need to get the job done.
It was just the other week that I mentioned one of our next home projects is the garden. We’ve decided to tackle what we can ourselves and then get a professional in to really pull everything together. That way we can then focus on keeping on top of everything once they’ve worked their magic.
Decorate with flowers
A quick and simple way to decorate your garden with flowers is to stock up on big flower pots and pick easy-to-care for flowers to fill them with. This makes them easier to move around the garden if they need more or less sunlight.
I like to fill pots with Pansies in lots of different colours. You could also plant some beautiful Sunflowers and Coneflowers to really add some bright colours to your garden.
I’m going to be doing a little research into the easiest flowers to care for. I don’t currently have the time to be caring for more unique flowers so I need flowers and plants that can look after themselves. Perhaps I’ll report back in a blog post later this month.
Think about lighting
If you’ve read any of my House & Home posts before you’ll know that I’m all about the lighting.
All-weather garden lights are an excellent way to add light to a dark corner, highlight steps, show off the flowers and simply give a relaxed and calming atmosphere to your garden.
Dust off garden furniture
Clean away any dust and cobwebs from your garden furniture. This will also give them a good shine and be much more inviting for your guests to sit on.
If you’ve got material inserts you should give these a wash and spray them down with your favourite air freshener to make sure they smell good.
We don’t have any garden furniture at the moment. Once our garden is up to scratch we’ll be buying some all-weather chairs and a table to use throughout the year. I also love the idea of buying a fire-pit – even in summer we usually get cold evenings.
Make sure the BBQ works
Crack out the barbecue, give it a clean and make sure it works. In our case we’ll be buying a new one as this is the first time we’ve had a garden since living in Sheffield. I’ve got no idea where to start when it comes to buying one so I’d love any tips.
It would also be a good idea to have a trial run of lighting the barbecue. Then you won’t have any mistakes on the day of your party.
Thanks to SGS Engineering for collaborating with me on this post.