A month has flown by and another year has started. I remember Grama saying stay young, your days feel long but when you get older there won’t be enough hours in your day to fit your needs. Now there doesn’t seem enough days to keep up with our lives.
So here it’s January and we are starting the planning for this year at the cottage. This months question were about the cottage plans and getting them done.
Without delay, our first question was:
1) What’s the plan for this year? This year is hopefully going to be finishing the main room. We finished off with getting the rest of the insulation in.
This year we have to start by getting the drywall up. The flooring for the cottage sits here at the house waiting to go in. Once the drywall is up and the flooring goes in, next comes the painting of the main room and then the plan is to put the new kitchen in.
I have two windows sitting here waiting for Spring to break and the windows will all be replaced in the house.
The dream is to get the new siding put up and to replace the small deck in the back and connect it to the large one and a nice sitting deck on the front would be also nice. But, and I say but because the Love Shack has taught us that we don’t get to do what we plan as she seems to have a mind of her own some days.
So the main goal for this year is the main room and the windows.
2) Did you ever consider the expense of paying for help compared to having friends help? This is a question that we have considered. The truth of the matter as was shared to me by another blogger, having help from friends and family may be costing more than hiring someone. That is probably true. I don’t think people consider the amount of time, effort and cost it goes into feeding a group. But, when we decided to keep the Love Shack instead of making it a rental property, we had given keys to our friends. The idea was to have them work on it and be part of it so it feels like their place too.
Looking back, I think we should have hired someone to do some of it as it would be much farther along. In the future, we will consider the other options as we are now getting to the point where we are ready to go to the lake to play more and work less. I say that now, but keeping in mind that husband and I enjoy building and it has been a real bonding experience for us also. There is also pride in doing it ourselves.
3) Have you considered spending Christmas at the cottage? That is a definite yes. We actually have divided our many bins and have bought more Christmas decoration specifically for the cottage.
Now saying that. Until we had the rest of the insulation in, we could not stay at the cottage. Not having the main room insulated created a very cold room in the Fall and Winter and a very hot room with that awful heat last Summer.
This year’s plans will make the cottage comfortable for both times. We do plan to keep the cottage open later this year and use it more in the Fall. Our hope is to celebrate New Years there this year with a select group of friends.
As always I thank you for your questions and your interaction with the blog. Keep the questions coming. I enjoy them.
Building The Love Shack 