2012 Home Goals

Last week I shared a few personal resolutions for the new year, but today I'm focusing on tangible goals for our home.  Have you guys read The Nesting Place blog?  I stumbled upon it a couple of weeks ago, and was hooked when I read her tag line, "it doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful."  And "do less, be more."  LOVE that!  I have a hard time finding this balance, and often strive to make things in our home "just right."  But, I see the futility in that, and long for more simplicity.  The Nester encourages us to love what we have in our home and to make it our own, rather than trying to mimic others.  Her philosophy kind of goes along with my personal resolution this year to love what I have. 

So, she posed some thought provoking questions and invited us all to share our own home goals.  Frank and I sat down to talk through ideas that are do-able for this year.  This is what we came up with.

1) Frank cut down a tree in the front yard this fall, and the stump still needs to come out.

2)  Our backyard is quite wide and shallow, backed by a steep ivy-covered bank.  Currently there are four small trees/shrubs scattered randomly in the open grass.  We need to get those suckers out, to open up the yard.  We will relocate them to more suitable homes.  There's a small dogwood, a rose trellis, a flaming azalea, and a random shrub.

3)  Our neighbors did a LOT of work to their house this year, including adding a wall along our property line.  Unfortunately we had just put a fence there last year, so theirs has rendered most of ours useless.  Here's what our fence looked like then.  See how it comes out of the side of the house, then goes back, all the way up that steep bank in the back? 

This is what it looks like now:

Their fence is a little more substantial than ours, would you say?  Most of our fence panels have been removed, but the front facing gate area needs to remain and function for keeping the dog in.  These harsh winter shadows are making it difficult to see the gap, but there is one.  We've propped loose panels to block the opening for now.  Here's an angle from our back yard.  Is anyone in need of picket fence panels?  We have 5 or 6 to get rid of. 

So, we need to reconfigure the fence in this area.  And remove the excess fence and posts along that wall.

 It wasn't easy building the fence on that steep bank.  Of course we cemented those posts so they'd be extra secure.  Those'll be reeeeal fun to get out.  Maybe we'll just take a chainsaw to it. 

So far the projects are pretty small and could be tackled easily in a weekend each.  Now, for the big one...

4)  Finish the porch. 

I am SOOOO super excited to have this porch, and so very grateful to my handsome, supportive, loving, capable husband for building it.  He has worked so hard to get to this point, slowly but surely.  I'll write up an entire post soon about the process so far and my vision for the finished porch.  This is what we have left to do:
- seal, grout, then seal again the tile floors
- install 2 porch doors
- build the railings
- cover the columns with finish wood
- build a small platform and stairs to the yard (to the left of that sliding door above)
- install the finish boards on the ceiling
- install electrical/lighting
- paint it all
- screen it in
- furnish and decorate  (my favorite part!)
- finish the bottom of the porch with lattice or some slats or something (including a small door for access) 
- landscape along the perimeter

There's a lot to do.  Having the little Bean around has slowed things down a bit.  It's difficult to work on the porch on the weekends, when we can all be spending family time together.   I'm always amazed to see bloggers doing major projects with little ones around.  How do they do it?!

5) Fix the rail on these stairs.  It's rusted through and really sketchy. 

The plan is to build a deck in this space that will join up to the porch.  You'll walk out of this door onto the future deck, and could turn right into the porch or go down to the yard via stairs. 

But, keeping the Nester's suggestions in mind, we're taking it slow and not pushing ourselves to have this deck portion done this year.  Perhaps it will happen next year.

Also on the "maybe" list:
- Our master bathroom is a hot mess.  Should we find ourselves with a surplus of time and money, we'd love to gut and reno it.  I'll spare you a photo, but leave you with this visual:  Avocado green tile, some of which was covered with beadboard by the previous owner.  The grout in the cave-like shower is all chippy and broken, and I'm scared to even think about what's growing behind it. 

- The black wrought iron on the front porch is waaaaay past it's prime.  Let's revisit the first photo.

 Our front porch is low enough to the ground where we could just have a couple nice substantial painted wood columns, without railings.  I'd love to replace the weird ceramic tile on the floor of the porch, too. Again, when win the lottery.  Or maybe next year!

There are a million other things I'd love to do, inside and out, but this list feels honest and doable.

Thanks, Nester, for inspiring us to think through this! 

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