Welcome to 2021! My three weeks away from the blog were wonderful (full of family time, some projects, and lots of Rory snuggles), but it does feel good to be back to work.

Every year, I like to create a home goals list to prioritize the projects I want to accomplish that year. (You can view last year’s right here.) Just like with any task, if you don’t make a plan, it’s unlikely to get done. Even if you don’t have a blog, I recommend this practice because it gives you clarity on where to focus your attention for the year. Plus, it always excites me and provides lots of motivation to start the year fresh! I enjoy looking at the 12 months ahead and setting my sights on what I really want to accomplish.

Last year, we accomplished A LOT around here (you can see all of the projects in this post), but there is still plenty to do. Getting the kitchen off our project list was a huge task and this year we can take on more manageable projects. So let’s get to my 2021 home goals master list. Then, I’ll break it down by room and dive into more details.

2021 Home Goals – Master List

• Organize Every Kitchen Drawer and Cabinet
• Upgrade from Queen to King-Sized Bed (New Mattress, Bed and Bedding)
• Makeover the Main Bedroom (Paint, Furniture, Rug, Wallpaper??)
• Install Shelves and Organizers in Office Closet
• Organize Office Built-Ins
• Baby proof the House
• Makeover the Backyard (Remove Deck, Build Patio, Add Landscaping, New Furniture)
• Refresh the Exterior
• Create a Hallway Gallery Wall and/or Landing Wall Treatment
• Renovate the Main Bathroom

This 2021 home goals list is already making me a tad nervous. There is a lot to do!! But it’s also getting me excited about the possibilities for the year ahead.

Organize The Kitchen

This first task is manageable and I think it’s a good way to ease into the year. For the remainder of January, I want to motivate you to purge things you no longer need and create organized systems for everything you do need. We’re doing just that in our new kitchen, as we want this space to be as efficient as possible for our little family. I have posts planned about organizing the pantry, a look inside every cabinet and drawer, and a post about how we DIY’ed our own charging drawer.

Main Bedroom Makeover

Somehow our own bedroom has been on the bottom of the to-do list for almost two years now, but that’s all about to change! When we moved in, we just put all of the same furniture and bedding from our old condo into our new bedroom and everything still works just fine for us. However, now that we’ve transformed so many other spaces in this house, it just doesn’t really feel like us anymore. I’m still in the early stages of planning, but through February and March, I want to work on refreshing this space from top to bottom.

I’m planning to paint the entire room and I’m leaning towards installing picture frame molding ( like the chair rail in Rory’s room, but this would be the entire wall) to add some interest to the boring walls. We also have a coffered ceiling in here and I want to figure out a cool way to highlight it. Maybe a subtle wallpaper up there? Maybe paint the ceiling the same color as the walls? I’m still brainstorming and I’m eager to get to work.

Once we have the walls figured out, it will be time for something we’ve been waiting a long time for…upgrading to a king-sized bed! Finn has resisted getting one for many years. The man is 6’2″, so you’d think he would want a little more space! I finally broke him down when I told him how we’ll want a bigger bed so Rory can come snuggle with us on weekend mornings. (The way to a man’s heart is through his daughter!) That means we need a new mattress, new bedding, and a new bed! And because of that, we’ll need a new rug, nightstands, and dresser. So, essentially, this entire room will be completely different! This will be my first big room makeover of 2021, so stay tuned for that.

Office Organization

While we finished the office last March, we didn’t end up doing anything in the office closet, except paint it the same color as the built-ins –  Valspar’s “Chimney Smoke”. I wanted to live with the space for a while and figure out what, exactly, we wanted to store in here before building anything. Right now, it just has an old IKEA dresser, our file cabinet, and random stuff! We haven’t come up with a gameplan yet, but I would like to store my photography equipment here, along with the file cabinet and other random goodies.

I also want to come up with a better system for our built-in cabinets and drawers. We had our printer in the first cabinet, but we have since moved it to the basement because Finn does more printing than I do. Because of this, things have gotten a bit disorganized. I want to come up with good systems for each space and share all of my ideas here on the blog.

Babyproof House

This one needs to happen, pronto, because Rory is getting more and more mobile. We’ll need to get baby gates for the stairs, locks for the cabinets, and more. I’m overwhelmed thinking about it all, but this is one task that must be done. I’ll be sure to report back with all of the gadgets we add to our house and how they’re working to keep our baby girl safe.

Backyard Makeover

This next one will be the biggest, and probably the most expensive project of the year. Now that our kitchen is completely done and ready for entertaining (whenever that is safe again!), we want to get our backyard ready for guests by the summertime. Our plan is to remove the deck completely and instead, install stairs down to the yard. We’ll then remove the grass between the house and the garage and add pavers or some sort of stone. I would love to have an outdoor dining table, couch area and maybe even a firepit. Plus, we will want lots of landscaping to make it a little urban oasis! I’m partnering with Yardzen on the project and we’ll be kicking off the plans this spring to, hopefully, be ready by summertime. Fingers crossed.

Exterior Upkeep

Our house is 100-years-old and while we’ve done tons of work on the inside, we haven’t been great about improving the outside of our house. The red brick is crumbling in some areas and the masonry on the front steps needs some major work. We’ll likely need to devote some dollars over the summer to work on some of these areas on the exterior of our home.

Hallway Upgrades

As I mentioned in this blog post, I’m on a mission to add more family photos to our home, especially now that Rory is here!

I’m thinking about adding a floor to ceiling gallery wall to our upstairs hallway or potentially on the stairwell landing. Or, I’m considering creating a hallway gallery wall and then installing a wood wall treatment on the landing wall. We’ll see, but the days of our boring hallways are numbered.

Main Bathroom Renovation

Finally, I’m thinking we’ll do another gut renovation in the fall of 2021 on our main bathroom. The space has lots of potential and we want to remove the outdated bathtub and make one large shower. We’ll also replace the vanity, the tile, and the toilet for a new and improved space. This space has been fine for us since we’ve lived here (and I even painted the tile floor), but we’re eager to have an upgraded bathroom customized to our style.

2021, Bring It On!

So there you have it, my 2021 home goals. I’ll plan to do a check-in in July to see how much we’ve crossed off this list. Now, I would love to know what’s on your 2021 home goals list! Let me know in the comments below and let’s all encourage one another to make our home dreams a reality.

Casey