Technically, we’re already two months into 2026 – but let’s pretend that I’m writing this at the start of the year, okay!? Not sure if I mentioned, but I was waiting for some website/back-end updates that took a long time. Now everything is ready to go and I’m hitting the ground running. Up first was sharing the most popular posts from last year – and now today, sharing my plans for 2026!
First, let’s review my plans for 2025 and see if we were able to get things done. I broke things down by house, so let’s continue that trend.
Personal Home
100% of our plans last year were about completing our basement bathroom. While it took us longer than we wanted, we actually finished our beautiful bathroom! However, we do still have some other projects to tackle.
- Finish basement drywall (we want to hire this out)
- Finish basement trim work
- Basement fireplace replacement
- Refresh upstairs bathroom
We installed a new vanity in our bathroom upstairs recently and I’d like to update the painted tub. Read more about the planned bathroom updates in this post – and stay tuned for some photos/details. We had to get our gas meter replaced in the summer, and then they do an inspection of all the natural gas appliances in your house (for us it was a lot of things!). Turns out the fireplace we have in our basement was not to code since there wasn’t a chimney. So it was turned off and now we need something new. Oh, and our A/C stopped working in the fall – so that needs to get fixed. (Both of those I’m waiting on the HVAC people to get some time on their schedule).
Rocky Retreat Cottage
This past weekend I knocked off a lot of little maintenance type tasks (caulking, painting, etc.) and there are a few more I want to do in the next week or so. Our cottage renting was actually busier in the off-months this year, so that meant less time to do these things. Although, the real reason we spent less time at the cottage is because we purchased a new soon-to-be-rental and have been devoting more time there.
Oh! We also had the kitchen counters replaced from laminate to quartz in the fall. There was water damage near the sink/dishwasher and it was a “we should probably get this fixed now when we’re not super busy” rather than have the problem get worse.
We did not add a shed, dock or hot tub. Should we? Probably.
Oh! And I want to add backsplash tiles to the kitchen too. I’ve had samples forever and narrowed it down, just need to figure out when.
Apartment Rental
Last year I didn’t have a to-do list for the apartment rental, and this year I’m not planning anything either. We did just get some basement subfloor fixed where we had water damage. I’m crossing my fingers that our water issues (overflowing window wells when there is heavy rain/thaw) are completely over. Other than that, no big plans for this space!
New Camp
Last year purchasing a new vacation camp was not on our radar. I DID want an additional rental property that we could convert to two units and do long-term rentals. Which was mentioned in my plans for 2025 post – but alas we have a new lakefront house that we will be doing short term Airbnb rentals instead. And that is where 85% of our time/energy/money has been spent the last few months. Here is a breakdown of what needs to be completed:
- Kitchen
- Install final wall cabinet
- Build and install floating shelves
- Backsplash
- Toekicks and finishing details
- Bathroom(s)
- Wallpaper install
- Paint touch ups
- Shower valve fixed
- King Bedroom
- Finish closet trim
- Rug?
- Twins Bedroom
- Build and install headboard
- Finish trim install
- Shelf built and installed
- Trim second coat paint
- Hotel Room
- Paint ceiling
- Paint walls
- Paint trim
- Cleanup floors / add rugs
- Lights?
- Dining room
- New table/chairs?
- Cabinets out
- Finish painting trim
- Living Room
- Reno stuff out
- New chair(s)
- Everywhere
- Cleanup (especially the garage!)
- Paint touch ups
- Organizing
- HVAC
The idea is to get an Airbnb listing created and posted at the start of March. We won’t be open until early summer, but at least we can start accepting bookings asap. We’ll also have a lot of outside stuff to do when the snow melts (putting in the docks, cleaning outbuildings, updating the deck) – so for now I am trying to get things done inside as much as I can. Ideally all the walls would be the same colour, but I’m only focusing on rooms as I’m updating them. So the hallway might be the “old” colour for a while.
Other Plans
Family-wise, we don’t have any big plans beyond our usual vacations/sports/regular activities. Last year I mentioned that we were thinking about where we want to build our “forever” house. We have that decided 90% and are in the slow process of getting everything organized. And that will be a big project, ha.
For now, I’m going to focus on writing about all the camp updates. So stay tuned for some upcoming blog posts :)
Oh! We also have to come up with a name and we have narrowed it down to two… Guess we need to decide soon!
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