Wow, so after accomplishing pretty much all of my 2020 house goals in half a year or so, I don't even know how 2021 will go. I am working from home completely through the summer for sure, then HOPE to be able to mostly work from home (4 home/1 office or 3 home/2 office weeks or not total WFH) permanently. That's for two reasons: 1. I can coordinate service easier when I am at home to supervise, and 2. I save so much more money working from home so we can afford more improvements.
There isn't a ton on the list this year, since I am working hard to save up for the Next Big Project, detailed in Q4. Since dividing goals into quarters worked so well last year, let's do the same for 2021!
Q1 Goals
Paint the trim and doors. I am NOT looking forward to this task, but when better than when it's cold out and COVID rages on? I haven't painted this since probably 2009-2010 so it's looking dingy. This will keep me busy for a while, as each door needs to be removed when it gets painted, then the furniture has to be pulled back from the walls when that gets redone... it makes me really not want to.
I am excited about prepping a big plant bed for the backyard though! Preliminary plans are for two fig trees, a few blueberry bushes, loquat trees, one or two small palms, and plenty of evergreens and easy to maintain foundation plants that will look super luxe. Add in a lot of bulbs, perennial flowers, and annual flowers for color, and it will look SO GOOD. The prep work is happening right now in January and on through February as well as putting some of the plants in the ground that need cold hours to thrive. The showy plants will come later, in April or May.
Depending on how everything works out, I'll pop in solar lighting, or see if I can get new lighting tethered to my pre-existing outdoor lighting in the backyard.
SOLAR OMG. We considered solar in autumn of 2016. Once you know who got elected, Patrick decided it would be wise to wait until he was out of office, because the president might have a tantrum and remove federal solar credit benefits. Now that we will have a new president who doesn't have tantrums, we signed the paperwork last week. I am excited!
This means tree trimming. We'll need to get a few branches cut back from our three gigantic oak trees to prepare for solar panels. I love trees but I hate our oak trees. They are incredibly large, and drop a ton of leaves every fall. We have to pay $100 or more most every month from October through January or February to have someone remove the large haul of leaves these things drop. I'm also going to have a whole oak removed from the back yard. This will give me room and light to grow a garden in a better area than what I have been trying to work in.
Q2 Goals
I also want to add a UV light to our HVAC system. It's good for humid environments like South Carolina, to keep mold from growing in the system and being blown into the house — something I know is an issue thanks to the yucky air vent covers I have to clean frequently. We actually need a whole new HVAC unit and ductwork but that's such a boring home update that we are putting it off until our unit finally kicks it. Just our luck it'll be during the summer.
A new fan for my bedroom. The one I have wobbles and has needed to be replaced for a few years. I already bought this flush mount ceiling fan with a built in LED light kit, it just needs to be installed, which we will do ourselves with the help of YouTube videos. This will happen before it gets warm enough to need a fan on nightly.
Finally, planting the showy plants! Annuals, flowers, yes! Plus seeding the grass again!
Q3 Goals
Now that we've had the backyard patio for a few seasons, I can tell we really need rain gutters along the back roof. Really hard rains are deteriorating the polymeric sand in the seams of the bricks on the ground where the rain falls off the roof. My dad and I installed gutters once and our efforts were dismal. Given that, I'll hire this one out.
I'm going to see if I can get a few small things like this done. Gutters along the back, and I need a carpenter type person to build better doors that lead to under our house. I did a terrible job of this several years ago and it needs to be remedied.
Q4 Goals
I have only one goal here and that is to plan for the Next Big Project. I will get a contractor in to assess if I can bump out my back bedroom wall by about 8 feet into the backyard. These 8 feet should be enough to build a modest walk-in closet and space for a stand up shower in the current ensuite half bath. I can THEN have the two current closets in my room sealed up in the bedroom and the space from those can go towards making each bathroom on the other side of them a little larger! The half bath would be redone with this renovation, and the full bath would wait til the next winter. I guess the closet could just remain sealed up for the time being.
If this is way too expensive or not feasible for our house, then I will simply plan to have the full bathroom redone. I plan on COVID being a non-issue in the autumn because we'll hopefully all be vaccinated, or at least any contractor that comes in the house would be. That's why these big inside projects must wait til late 2021 or into 2022. And money, also another large reason.
Also... if we get the full bath redone, it HAS to be in the winter so we don't have to go without showers for too long. Without sweating too much, I can last for a week or so (including hot tub baths, lol), that should be enough time for the shower to get tiled, right?!!
