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Friday is the first day of summer, so it seemed appropriate to talk about making the most of our outdoor living. My back porch is my happy place. It’s where I go at the end of the day to unwind and rejuvenate.

How can you make the most of outdoor living even on a hot summer day? I’d love to hear your thoughts, but I’ll start with my own.

Capture the Breeze

It starts with air movement. An inset covered porch will not receive a lot of air flow.

A covered porch with two sides open – ie: at the outside corner of the house, will get far more natural air movement.

A tack-on back porch with three sides open is even better.

Arguably, the best is the wraparound porch which is able to catch natural breezes from two different directions.

Torquey Fans

Next, we want to augment the circulation of air with a ceiling fan. While there is no shortage of ceiling fans on the market – not all create the same air flow. In our last house, we had these cute outdoor fans with blades that looked like wooded fern leaves.

Attractive, but only so-so at air movement. In our next house, we selected three large multi-bladed ceiling fans because the space was large.

In retrospect, we should have been focused not on size, but on torque. The more torque the fan creates, the greater the movement of air. The more torque the fan produces, the more stress there is on the components of the fan – thus these fans tend to be more expensive. So if you’re looking for air movement instead of aesthetics, torque is the name of the game.

Pest Control

Where we live, we have lots of flying insects – everything from flies, mosquitoes, wasps, and carpenter bees. As a result, we screened in our back porch. On early summer mornings or evenings, we slide back our triple stacking sliding glass doors to completely opening our house to the back porch.

As the day warms up, we slide the doors closed but can still enjoy our screened paradise.

Guy, my husband, wanted the ability to walk directly off the porch directly to his putting green without going through a small screen door, so we got a retractable screen on one panel. He loves it, but then he isn’t as bug-phobic as me. When the screen is up – I insist the sliding glass doors are closed. But we have discovered a strategic byproduct of our retractable screen. When it is time to clean the floor of the back porch, we can roll up the screen and use the blower to blow off the dust and debris that people or dogs may have dragged in on their feet.

Cooking

Other features of our outdoor living is the grill. It is at the far end of the porch – keeping the heat away from the seating area. The hood is key here, drawing the heat and smoke up and away allowing the space to be habitable.

Our neighbor’s house chose to move their grill completely outdoors keeping the heat and smoke away and without the expense of the hood. Great when the weather is fair, but unfortunately limits its use to non-rainy days.

To facilitate grilling, we added a casement window so food could be passed directly outside to the grill master.

It’s a fun novelty idea that we rarely use, as it’s just as easy to walk around to the side door. When we have a large group seating outside, it does cut down on the trips to and from the kitchen with clean and then dirty dishes.

Another feature of our outdoor paradise is the TV mounted just above the fireplace. One of my favorite weekend activities is to lay on the couch and watch golf – mostly with my eyes closed (golf naps are the best).

And because we have a waterfall next to our porch, the soothing sounds of water and the soft summer breezes also combined for the ultimate nap environment.

Lighting

On a late summer evening, we will turn on the LED lights in our outdoor fireplace for a soft colorful glow. We have multiple color options so can select the color that best matches our mood. We also have battery operated flicking candles for a soothing glow.

Our adjacent putting green is also lit with low voltage lights. This was a game changer for us. Instead of sitting next to complete darkness, we have a dramatic view of up-lit trees and can capture the flickering glow of light bouncing of the moving water of the waterfall.

Finally – don’t forget the speakers. Our outdoor speakers surround the putting green. But if you haven’t prewired for speakers, there are now dozens of ways to add music to your outdoor living paradise via a bluetooth.

In the south, the summer heat/humidity/storms can be unforgiving. But these longer days can still be enjoyed outdoors if we make the proper accommodations. Don’t let the dog days of summer keep you in, get outside! Did I miss anything on your must-have list for your outdoor paradise? I’d love to see your favorite spaces!