My 14 Goals for 2020
Goal #1 – Take Full Advantage of Having My Husband Home 24/7
Last week the HH was very helpful. He removed the cork in the kitchen, changed light bulbs, raked the yard, sprayed for bugs, made a meatloaf, leveled off the compost area, took Lucy to the vet {not an easy task} cleaned out the drains {gag!} folded shipping boxes for me and did the post office runs. Such a helpful guy that one. 🙂 Oh, and he did my hair.
Goal #2 – Take Better Care of Myself.
Not all the ideas I have a great ones. 😉
Goal #3 – Get Organized
As long as I get it all done by May 2nd, I’ll be happy. I work better under pressure anyway.
The plan was:
- March 22 – 28
Paint Kitchen Walls,Trim Doors and Office Door - March 29 – April 4th –
Finish Garden Beds {Raspberry & Asparagus Beds, 3 New Flower Beds Along the Back of the House} - April 5th – 11th – Paint Master Bedroom Walls, Trim and Doors
- April 12th – 18th –
BUY Window Treatments for Master Bedroom - April 19th – May 2nd Make Window Treatments for Sunroom {I may wait until fall for this one}
Goal #4 – Get Proper Window Coverings on All Our Windows.
I have the window treatments and hardware for the bedroom, and the fabric for the sunroom Roman shades but an currently using the excuse that I can’t do any sewing until the sunroom is cleared of plants.
Goal #5 – Master Bedroom Make Over
Anyone know anything about removing wallpaper? How hard is it to do? Any tips?
Goal #6 – Kitchen Update
Last week the HH worked on removing the {awful} cork squares from the wall in the kitchen. It was a bit of a pain and a rather frustrating task for him.
But the spot looks SO MUCH better painted out white!!!
The kitchen is coming along… slowly but surely. Today I plan on putting a second coat of paint on the trim work and then it’s on to the doors {there are 3 in the kitchen area}. Two of the doors will need to be sanded/stripped first so that should be fun.
Goal #7 – Install Vegetable Garden
The garden boxes and beds are in and so far we’ve got peas, breakfast radish and spinach up in the garden. I am still waiting for the beets and lettuce to pop through the soil and for the raspberry and asparagus I planted last month to show signs of life.
Rhubarb is doing AWESOME as are the tomato seedlings that are hanging out in the sunroom. 🙂
Garden To Do List for April
Figure out what to do with the old pavers.Create 2 more brick edged flower borders.Till up area for raspberry and asparagus beds.- Plant hydrangeas along the back of the house
Create a seating area {a super simple one}Figure out where to put all the extra pea gravelLevel off compost area {95% there!}Prep lawn for grass seed- Mulch flower beds
- Prune yew hedges to allow for more light near the asparagus patch
Goal #8 – Explore More of Maine
Looking forward to my next day trip with the HH! Harpswell, Maine is on the list next, but it will have to wait a bit. Hopefully not to much longer!
On the radar for exploring Maine this next month:
Bar Harbor, MaineLincolnville Center General Store in Lincolnville, Maine- Wallace’s Market in Friendship, Maine
Alewives Fabric Store in Nobleboro, Maine- Harpswell, Maine and Bailey Island
Goal #9 – Host Some Sort of Get Together
Goal #10 – Read/Listen to 12 Books
This week I tried listening to Into the Wilderness by Sara Donati on audiobook but only lasted 12 minutes because I couldn’t get into the narrators voice. What is wrong with me!!! The book has great reviews too.
I am currently waiting for Olive, Again and The Nightingale.
So far I have read/listened to:
- Olive Kitteridge
- Smitten Kitchen Every Day: Triumphant and Unfussy New Favorites
- Natural Color: Vibrant Plant Dye Projects for Your Home and Wardrobe
- The New Bungalow Kitchen
- Container Gardening by Stephanie Donaldson
- A Piece of the World
- The War I Finally Won
- Vertical Gardening
- Front Yard Gardens
- The Complete Cooking Light Cookbook
- Beach House Style
Goal #11 – Learn A New Skill or Craft
I haven’t taken any adult education classes or learned any new crafts this year but check out this wool pallet bunny I spotted for sale and the garden center last week when I went to pick up the remaining seed packets I needed. Isn’t it cute?
I think I might try and make one for next year. Looks easy enough, don’t you think?
Goal #12 – Visit 12 Museums, Historical Homes or Botanical Gardens {and bakeries too!}
Currently on hold.
January
- Maine Maritime Museum
- Maine Mineral and Gem Museum
- The Island Market
- Cafe DiCocoa
- Hungry Hollow Country Store
February
- Two Fat Cats Bakery
- Portland Museum of Art
- Speckled Ax
- Atlantic Baking Company
- Rockland, St. George, Cushing and Port Clyde Maine
March
- Bar Harbor and Desert Island Adventures Day One, Day Two and the Summer Cottage Rental Tour.
- Tinder Hearth Bakery in Brooksville, Maine
Goal # 13 – Reach 5,000 Etsy Sales by the End of The Year
As of this morning, I have made 3660 sales on Etsy. That’s up from 2804 on January 1st. This past week I dyed wool {and listed it on Etsy last night} made more garden markers {they’re selling like hot cakes! plus they’re fun to make} and organized my hand painted ornaments into bins. It was a productive week in the wool and pottery department.
Rug hooking wise, I finished another sail, but since hooking is something I do in the evenings this time of year, I haven’t had much time to get anything done because I’ve been pretty much falling into bed exhausted these days.
Goal #14 – Once a Month Menu Planning {for 2}
The whole meal planning thing has pretty much gone out the window the past month or two, but I did manage I freeze 3 extra portions of chicken chili and 8 breakfast muffins.
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Have YOU made any goals for this year? If so, DO TELL! We all want to hear about them.
Have a great Sunday everyone, enjoy sunshine.
~Mavis
Alice says
A wall paper remover steamer works well but I have also used a spray bottle to spray warm water all over the wall paper, let it sit a minute then gently pull the wall paper back. Working in small sections, keep spraying warm water on the wallpaper and it will easily peel off. Wash the wall well when done. It was not a terrible job to do.
Deborah says
Alice is right. If it’s the shiny paper, you will need to score it with a wallpaper remover scorer. Spray the warm water, or I used warm water with a tad of liquid fabric softener in it. I took it off in a good sized bathroom. Not too bad. One down, one to go. LOL
Gwenn Ferguson says
I concur about using a spray bottle with fabric softener. My prior house (1915 farm house) had 5, yes 5, layers of wallpaper on the CEILING in a hall and most rooms had at least 3 on the walls. The kitchen had the shinny “wipe-able” kind. If you score the wall paper then spray on a mix of very warm water and Downy (my choice), let that sit on the wall paper and soak in a bit it comes of sooooo easy. Bonus, your house smells good and your hands are soft (if you don’t use gloves). Make sure the water is at least very warm, if you use cold water in the spray bottle it doesn’t seem to work as well.
Jeni says
A have to second the idea of a steamer. It made removing wallpaper in our old house soooo much easier!
Claudia says
You can buy a wallpaper scorer at the hardware store. Score the wall really well and spray fabric softener. Or you can spray wallpaper remover also from hardware store. Usually peels right off….time consuming but not difficult
Tracy Pease says
Fill a Hudson sprayer with warm water and a capful of Fabric softener. Spray an area and WAIT at least 15 minutes. Then remove with a putty knife. If the paper is glossy, score the paper first with a tool called the paper tiger. This allows the fabric softener moisture to penetrate the paper. Good luck! I actually love removing wallpaper, but some paper is more challenging than others.
Trava Olivier says
Go to your local hardware store and get a wall paper scorer. Rub it over the wall. You can also purchase a trigger spray bottle of wall paper remover. Spray the wall after scoring and allow it to sit and penetrate through the wallpaper so it soak to the adhesive back. Use a rubber putty knife and start scraping! Some areas may take a second application. When finished wash the wall well, I recommend using TSP. Then fill and cracks, holes, etc… to prep the walls for paint. Prime and paint! It really is more time consuming than difficult!
Lynne says
I think that the kind of paper and glue used can be a factor. I tried using a steamer on wallpaper in my kitchen and gave up because it was so messy and not all that easy to get the paper off, even after scoring the thick, coated paper. I had better luck with peeling off the top layer of the paper by hand, spraying the rest with a mixture of hot water and fabric softener, letting that sit for a few minutes, and then scraping the paper/glue off. Once the paper comes off, take the time to scrape all the glue off and try to get right down to the underlying paint immediately. I got so excited about getting the paper off that I did not clean up areas immediately. I had to go back and scrape and sand again and that was a pain. If you have some smudges of glue that are just not coming off but the surface is otherwise smooth, buy a primer specifically to go over a surface that had been papered and is now going to be painted. That magical stuff seals in any vestiges of glue (so it doesn’t go mushy when you paint) and gives you a nice, smooth surface. As others have said, this is time-consuming but not really difficult.
Nancy from mass says
If your house has plaster walls (probably does due to the age) you can use a warm water spray bottle with a little bit of vinegar added in. Yes it smells funky but the smell dissipates. When I bought my house 23 years ago, every room had wallpaper. some were shiny, some were regular paper. If you spray it and walk away for five or 10 minutes and come back, it comes off even easier. I actually enjoyed peeling wallpaper off. I decided to do the upstairs hall one day when my son had jumped in the shower and by the time he got out, all the wallpaper was down. He walked out the bathroom, looked around and said “how long was it in there?”
Nancy from mass says
Oh, I did not use a scorer first.
Christy says
Agree, if you have plastic walls. I soaked the wallpaper using a spray bottle, waited and then used a plastic putter knife (sometimes metal) to scrap off. No extra chemicals or devices needed. It is time consuming however.
Diana says
How easily the wall paper is removed depends on whether it was put onto bare drywall or on a wall that was prepped with paint first. If it was put onto bare drywall, expect the drywall paper to peel off in places and you’ll have to do some wall patching. If it was put onto a prepped wall – YIPPEE! – it’ll come of relatively easy.
There are drywall scorers that put pinholes into the paper to allow paper remover to soak into the glue to soften it and allow the paper to be removed. If you don’t purchase a remover (get at HD, Lowes, Ace or WM), then use warm water with some fabric softener in it.
I used to work for HD in the wallpaper dept, lol, and a girlfriend of mine did it professionally, so I got a few tips from helping her. Here’s a link to the HD guidelines…
https://www.homedepot.com/c/ab/how-to-remove-wallpaper/9ba683603be9fa5395fab907387bb3f
Good Luck!
And btw – how the heck have we gotten to week 17 already???? wow…
Peg says
What is breakfast radish? Granted, I’m not much of a gardener, but that’s a new one!
As far as removing wallpaper, good luck. Twenty-five years ago we spent time over three years removing wallpaper from most every room in the house we had recently bought. Never again.
Mavis Butterfield says
They are so fun to grow! https://www.botanicalinterests.com/product/French-Breakfast-Radish-Seeds
Lana says
It is worth every single penny to hire someone to remove wallpaper. Every room we did in this house that was wallpapered top to bottom when we bought it took us weeks. The last two rooms we hired to have done and they were huge rooms and one was double papered. Three hours later and $800 and no wallpaper. WOrth every penny.
Judy says
Your husband is a definite keeper….such a handy guy to have around. I have used the water/fabric softener method with great sucess. I have a photo of my son when he was about 2 years old stripping wallpaper in the nude!. I was peeling off the paper when he was in the tub one night and he could not resist coming out of the tub to help. I need to go find the photo now
Bridget P. says
Goals so far for this year:1 Larger garden and plant successsive crops.- I’ve always been a tad lazy with my garden but because of goal number 2 I need to do this. 2. dust off my water canner and get back into canning. I also bought a Carey canner off of amazon with my birthday moeny from my dad. I also have a food saver attachment for cans and have been putting dehydrated and dry stuffs in cans and taking out the air so fun! I made lilac jelly yesterday and oh my so delicious! Next to make dandilion jelly! 3. get my pup certified as a hearing dog for me- on hold until we can get back to the trainer for classes.4. get down to my goal weight. I started last year in may exercising and dieting. The quarantine derailed me a bit since I started quarantine the last week of february, but the last few weeks i’ve started back up again. that’s all I have so far for goals.
Linda Sand says
I highly recommend using a plastic scraper when removing wallpaper. I have put one too many gouges in the wall using metal ones with sharp edges. Also, you need to protect ALL your flooring; those strips of wallpaper can be very long and you can’t always control where they land.
LoLo R. says
If the wallpaper is older or multiple layers on old plaster, buy or rent a wallpaper steamer. It is easy to use and will save hours of scraping!!
Emily says
Removing wallpaper ranges from simple to exquisitely painful depending on the type and how well it was applied. Ours erred on the painful, due to vast amounts of paste that had to be steam softened, scraped, and then washed with a special solvent. I will be sending good vibes that you have the east kind!
Renay Bennett says
My bathroom had LAYERS of wallpaper and paint and I tried to take it all off. Ended up with major gauges in the walls. Hired a sheetrock guy to come in and put the mud on all the walls and make them smooth. Best money I every spent!
Renay Bennett says
May I say that I love the chalkboard – just like the Brady Bunch!!!