Enjoying a backyard cookout with our friends to break in the new Patio Set.

Today we had a pre-Father’s Day party on our brand new patio set that we got from Kmart. We invited our friends Greg and Adrienne over along with their kids for a cook out. We’re all part of the same CSA (Community Sourced Agriculture) and we even had some of our most recent crops with dinner. The kids enjoyed hot dogs and the adults had some Johnsonville Chorizo patties along with fresh pineapple and guacamole. After dinner we enjoyed a delicious berry crumble that Adrienne made. It was the perfect way to break in the new set.

The new Patio Set its new location.

Father’s Day has typically been a day for us to enjoy a BBQ with Dad. We sometimes do breakfast and in the past we’ve done a kayak trip, a trip to the Cape to make sand angels, a trip to Mystic to go to the Aquarium and on my first Father’s Day I had gone to Hot Air Balloon Festival. Now I work weekend nights so I sleep all of Father’s day away (a dream of many dads, LOL). However, this coming Father’s Day we’re taking a Boston Harbor Cruise on the Spirit of Boston and that should be memorable.

We are going to get a lot of use out of this patio set. Most of the summer we eat outside on a nightly basis. We’ll have friends and family over for cookouts. I look forward to many backyard cookouts with this patio set, having my own Dad over so he can enjoy the kids. Allison and her friend Kelly are doing a Backyard Books and Bags Bash, a co-branded party to sell Barefoot Books and 31 Gifts. This new Set is going to get some use. But first I had to build it.

Almost ready to put the tiles in place. So close to being done, I can smell the cookouts to come.

I was given this opportunity to do a Shoppertunity for Collective Bias (see disclosure below) and go to Kmart to purchase a patio set. When asked why I think I’d be a good fit for this I explained that we had recently moved into our house and had been using a borrowed plastic table and chairs from my parents. We love our patio but that table was in rough shape (see previous post about the Pac Man table). We have a beautiful patio and want to spend time on it with our friends and family having cookouts and other fun times so a patio set would be the perfect thing for us to buy.

Grilling up a storm, there are going to be many more nights of this in this Patio Set.

In our instructions there was a link to this great #KmartOutdoor catalog with many selection options.

I forwarded it to my wife, Allison, and asked her which one she thought would work best for us. We knew we wanted seating for at least 6 and we wanted a rectangle table so the choice for us was a no brainer, we picked the Jaclyn Smith Today Strathmore Collection table and chairs on page 22.

I had recently attended a trip to Chicago to learn about Shop Your Way rewards (You can follow @ShopYourWay on Twitter) and even more recently I purchased a new tv through the program so I had some points I could use. I also learned about MyGofer and so for the heck of it I went online to see what deals I could find. The set was on sale at $250 off, the best deal of the lot I think, and that put it at the exact amount I had to spend less one penny. So I used my Shop Your Way Rewards and a MyGofer credit to place the order online and was excited even more because I was able to use PayPal to make the purchase. You can read about the whole patio set purchase post from this past Friday.

We went as a family to Kmart pick up the table and check out what else we wanted to buy to go with it including an umbrella and an umbrella base. We also wanted to take the opportunity to put in some new pots for plants and pick up S’Mores ingredients. My Dad also came along to help us bring the patio set home. I documented the whole trip in this Google + Album.

I spent the next couple of days assembling the set in between sleeping during the day and working at night. Assembly was pretty easy and I supplemented the tools provided with some professional ones that I had that did the job better. You can assemble the set with the tools provided but it would be slow going so I advise a metric socket wrench set to help speed things along.

So now with the table and chairs all built and the table placed into our backyard we’re excited about how much nicer it is looking already. I’ve ordered an umbrella that has 18 LED lights that are solar powered so we can have some light when we eat later at night. I’m also getting a patio set cover so that the giant tree above and the birds in it don’t mess up the table and so we can protect it when it rains. Depending upon how badly it snows this winter I may just use the cover to protect it over the winter, too. I was made aware of patio covers because there was a coupon inside the box the chairs came in with a 25% off coupon. Saving even more money, score!

You can also find more Kmart Outdoor Living deals that were in this weekend’s flyer. I found these deals:

• $50 off the garden Oasis leisure lounger.
• HUGE savings on the Jaclyn Smith 7 pc Dawson dining set this week.
• $100 off a char-broil 6 burner gas grill.
• Father’s day decorations 60% off a hanging basket plant stand @kmart
• 60% off a DELUXE hanging basket plant stand

You can make sure that you are in the know for savings each week by checking out Kmart Weekly Deals. And on top of that Kmart is using social media in a good way with the Kmart Twitter (@Kmart) and Facebook (Kmart’s Facebook Page) accounts.

There are other bloggers who made purchases as well, you can follow our stories by checking out the hashtag #KmartOutdoor on Twitter and Google +.

The kids having their dinner.

Disclosure: I am a member of the Collective Bias™ Social Fabric® Community. This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias™. Opinions about the product, the store and everything else are 100% my own. #CBias #SocialFabric