Welcome to The Ana Mum Diary, friends old and new, especially if you have hopped over from Karen at Making Spaces. Grab a chair and a cuppa, let’s get to know one another a little better.

This post is part of a HUGE, week long online blogging event called the #UKHomeBlogHop.  

It’s been expertly organised by the very funny and talented Kimberly at Swoon Worthy and the idea is that each day at 11am, around 5 interior and lifestyle bloggers publish a post to show off their home and garden summer style.  I’ll pop a list at the bottom, so that you can go visit all of the blogs.  I’ve honestly been blown away, and feel completely out of my depth compared to some of the other stylish homes I’ve seen so far.

For new readers, I’m Amanda Cottingham (from Nottingham)  and I’ve been blogging about, lifestyle, travel and interiors for over 6 years – The home loving traveller!  I’m married to Alex (aka The Tall Fella) and have have two daughters and a pampered pooch Bennett. I’m the blogging editor and expert in all things home and interior with Kaleidoscope and Britmums, the UK’s largest blogging network.

It’s been awhile since I did a post like this showing you around my home. I’ve always got a project on the go (the curse of a blogger who loves interiors I guess) and the past few months I have been concentrating on tweaks to the two areas, I’m going to show you now.

My conservatory and Garden.  

My conservatory over the winter had become a complete dumping ground, the place where everything seemed to end up.  I think I’d fallen out of love with it, so come spring something needed to change.  We need this as a room to spend evenings in, in the summer, as it stays lovely and warm (sometimes a bit too warm) and once the double doors are open, gives us some additional seating when we have friends round.

We had a fairly tight budget, but it just needed a major declutter and freshening up with a few accessories.  I went for quite cool subdued coloured ones, to try and give the feeling  that it wasn’t so hot in there, as we don’t have any air conditioning.

I’m really thrilled with the result, its got a bit of scandi vibe and now gets a lot more use!

• Rug, Vase, large floor light and coffee table – Kaleidoscope.
• Sofa – DFS
• Print – Desenio

I also wanted to use this post today, to show you around the alfresco dining area of my garden, so I could show you how I styled up the space for an informal adult BBQ.

Now I’m going to admit that this space, is still very much evolving *ahem* as we hadn’t when I took this images, settled on a garden table and chairs.  It arrived today actually, so we’ll be putting it together soon, and I’ll be over on the Kaleidoscope blog telling you all about it.  This gives you an idea though of the look we will end up with. I want it to look more impromptu and eclectic, hence the mismatched chairs.

I decided to use the potting table that we have from Kaleidoscope as a little outdoor bar, and I am so pleased with it. 

Set up with glasses, cocktail shakers and bottles of alcohol  is such a great way to have everything that you need to hand when having friends round for a BBQ. I must admit, mixing cocktails is my favourite part!

• Potting table, gold LSA glasses Kaleidescope.
• Lulu Guinness Radio (just seen) VQ.
• She believed She Could Print (suitable for outdoor use) from Poster Lounge.
• Lanterns Homesense

Now if this is more of an adult BBQ, then I don’t usually dress the table with melamine and plastic, opting for bone china and glass I just think its so much nicer to eat off. So wanted to show just that today.

• Table cloth, glasses and plates – Kaleidescope
• Napkins H&M Home
• White planters M&S

View down from my bedroom onto the table.

When it comes to colour and dressing a table I tend to choose lots of white, or near white, and add an optional other colour. I used the colour of the water glasses on the table which is a mauve pink, and then added other items like the flowers and candles in the same colour to keep it cohesive.   Adding mismatched napkins, but keeping them neutral keeps with the impromptu eclectic look.

Its always a good idea to have extra seating, and places to put drinks, so I set up our Homesense bench and string bubble seat with a small table.  If you’ve spotted those seats around, as I think several places sell them, make sure you try them, they are so comfy, I wish i’s bought another in this colour, and I haven’t seen them since.

We have lots of pots of herbs near our kitchen door, so I move them nearer the BBQ to use in when we are cooking. We sometimes use a couple of springs of rosemary if we need add extra marinade to things.

It’s not often that I get the opportunity to use a tablecloth or runner, but if you are dining alfresco it’s a good idea to have some way of making sure it doesn’t blow in the wind if you do use one.  I used some pebbles that were gifted to me when I visited Israel, but you could use undecorated ones from the garden, or buy tablecloth weights.

I couldn’t complete this post without showing you my Walton’s summer house, that was completed last year, you can read all about that HERE. It’s been the perfect addition to our garden and it honestly gets so much use.

Someone called it my hippy retro room the other day, I think I’ll take that!

Now if you enjoyed this, I urge you to go visit Becky at  A Beautiful Space who is showing you her playroom makeover.

Please find all the blogs joining in the hop below. The posts go live at 11am each day.

Tidy Life