Reflecting On Our 2023 Home Plans

*This is a collaborative post on our 2023 home plans, but all thoughts and words are my own

As 2023 nears it’s end it’s coming up to four years since me and Luke got the keys to our first home together. And I have no idea where the time has gone. In the first five months we did a lot of work, but then life kicked back in and things have moved a lot slower since.

Even though the years not yet over I’m already looking forward to 2024 and making a list of the things I want to do, or buy for our home. The top priority will be furniture for Luke’s office (when it’s fully built). This will be everything from the practical storage to the seating. I’m keen to get multifunctional things like these footstool and pouffe‘s from Big Bertha as it can be used as additional seating when Luke’s friends are round, but then as a footstool when he’s in there relaxing.

At the start of the year we made some 2023 home plans and I’ve also come up with my own list of smaller snagging items to complete over the year. But how many of those things have we actually completed?

Things we’ve done not on our 2023 home plans list

Lets start with some really positive bits, and that’s everything we’ve done that we didn’t even plan to do at the start of the year.

Around six months ago I created a snagging list. I noted down all the tiny little things that weren’t fully complete. They included things like paint that needed touching up, small bits of filling around sockets etc. While not everything has been done I’ve made really good progress with this and hope to tick off even more before the end of 2023.

We finally got our downstairs toilet wallpapered which was a long time coming. We’ve had the jungle/ leaf print paper for about three years, and I’m so happy it’s now up.

Living room updates

We made a few updates in our living room including putting up some new shelving for books. It started off because we got our wedding flowers preserved and one thing that was made was some book ends. Luke suggested putting up some small shelves to display them on. And it all spiraled from there. But I am so happy as it gives me even more space for books and a great place to properly display some of my favourites.

The bulbs in our beautiful free standing lamp weren’t great, so we upgraded them to LED smart bulbs from 4Lite*. We have them all set up via our Alexa device so can turn them off and on through voice command. And they’ve made such a difference as they’re dimmable (perfect for when you’re movie watching) and you can change their colour.

I am really happy with one side of our living room, but the other side still feels like there’s something missing. Perhaps a footstool for the big chair, or something that would be in the space where our Christmas tree currently is.

Finish our garage renovation

This has been our biggest renovation project of the past few years. 2023 was set to be the year, but this isn’t going to be complete by the end of the year.

We’ve made great progress. By the point of this post going up we have floors built, a ceiling and most of the walls done. So I would say a lot of the big jobs have now been done, but there’s still quite a way to go.

In Luke’s main room we need to; fully wire, add coving, decorate, fit carpet, fit skirting and architrave and then do a second fitting of sockets/ switches. Then we can get the furniture, seating space and soft furnishings in.

Then in our utility space we need to add the wall between that and the garage in, tile the floor, add coving/ skirting/ architrave and decorate. And then build the cabinets and room around it.

So there’s still a lot to do, but it’s heading in the right direct. Of course, as the garage isn’t renovated our upstairs isn’t decluttered and organised, but that’s a 2024 job.

Home plans for 2023- finishing off our front garden

We have one tiny thing left to do in our front garden (painting a bit of wall), but other than that we’re all done.

My dad did a great job helping us to re-pave around our front door. The whole space looks so much better than it has. We even found a local gardener who is going to help us maintain the space over the coming years. This way we can make sure it doesn’t get overgrown with weeds again.

Replacing our back gates

I spoke about being scammed out of £3,000 a paid for some gates in my post at the start of the year. Sadly sad claims were pretty useless and we didn’t manage to get any of the money back. So we had to pay out for another set of gates ourselves. After our bad experience we didn’t want to rely on a company again. So Luke and his dad did the job themselves and they look great.

Now our home is fully secure, and the gates make such a huge difference to the look of our home.

Other home plans for 2023

After these bigger things we had a few more things on the list that have been completed.

• We got our back door and window replaced.
  Visually it doesn’t look too different but it makes such a difference having a door that now opens outwards.
• New ceiling lights in our living room.
  I absolutely love our new lights as they fit with the room far better. Plus they’re much brighter when we do switch them on.
• Replacing our garden fences.
  At the start of the year we had replaced some but not all of our fences. But earlier this year I bought and painted all the remaining panels and they’re in.

Did you finish everything on your 2023 home plans list?