Affordable Outdoor Lighting

Getting our deck ready every summer is a labor of love. There is a lot of bleaching, scrubbing and power washing involved – but it is totally worth all the elbow grease. As soon as everything has been cleaned and the cushions get put out, I begin a daily ritual of slipping outside with my morning cup of coffee to soak up the sun. With school wrapping up this week, the kiddos are going to be sleeping in and I enjoy getting a break from the morning chaos involved with getting ready for the bus.

At the end of the day, the deck area is shaded and makes it ideal for entertaining. We have a lot of trees in our backyard and for whatever reason, we frequently have a cool breeze – even on the hottest days. When the sun goes down, we have outdoor lights that we use, but I’ve found that they provide too much light. After dinner, I want to tone things down and create a warm and laid-back vibe. To me, there’s nothing better than candlelight to set the mood and during a recent visit to IKEA, I was thrilled to find affordable outdoor lighting. They had clear glass tea light holders and matching candles and they were ridiculously affordable. I picked up a couple of packs of holders (I may go back for more) and loaded up on lots of candles. They make our outdoor space so pretty and I love the atmosphere.

Affordable Outdoor Lighting

IKEA – Candle Holder (tea light candle) 3 pack $1.99 + Glimma unscented candle in a metal cup 24 pack $6.99

I love the fact that these candles are in a metal cup, it makes replacing them carefree. In the past I had to freeze my glass votives in order to pop out the remaining wax, a friend gave me a tip to put a little water in the bottom before you insert the candle. I still use this trick for candles that don’t come in metal cups. I wanted to share a few photos of my favorite IKEA lanterns, the metal cutout details are amazing.