Post-pandemic summer: Patios, Backyards, Getting Outside

Last summer was mostly spent indoors (for health reasons). But there are many dimensions to your health: it's more than avoiding illness. Gatherings and community are essential for long-term emotional and mental health. Enjoying the post-pandemic outdoors with family and friends can happen in your own backyard. 

With two summers to pack into one, this will be more than a Sunday afternoon cookout, eating a single slider and heading home to stream something. Set the right mood for your vibrant summer get-together by setting your outdoor space to light and music with flair and convenience. Make it that Texas barbecue where your friends' toddlers fall asleep on them and they're still out there, catching up with each other. 

Usual Patio or Garden Party 

For that kind of celebration, there's more to do than setting the table and lighting the fire pit. Buying and preparing food to host something outback is a feat by itself. If you don't have to charge, set up, and manage the playlist with Bluetooth, that's more time (and energy) to chat it up. If there are kids, dogs (or both), then that's a no-go on the tiki-torches. Open flames in the back of your mind? But music and lighting are a big part of your gathering coming together. Those two parts Evolve can help with. 

Unseen, but Well-Heard

Even without audio wires, music is more enjoyable with a surrounding effect. Conversation is much better with a consistent volume from the pool to the driveway. 

As a Home Technology Association https://htacertified.org/ certified company, we know integrated and smart home technology, literally inside and out. The highest-quality, refined sounds can be a discrete, natural look that blends into the porch, patio, or landscape. 

Imagine a world where you can control everything in your house with the command of your voice, a tablet, or a smartphone. That means answering the door without leaving the comfort of your couch, monitoring your entire house even when you’re at work, and locking up all entrances with just one tap before you hit the sack.

Now, what if we told you that such a world exists right now?

Welcome to the world of smart homes.

What Is a Smart Home

Smart home technology connects your appliances, thermostat, locks, and more, to one main centralized system. This system can be controlled with a device such as your mobile phone and allows you to manage your house--even when you’re far from the hustle and bustle of Dallas.

To paint you a better picture, here’s what it’s like to live in a smart home.

The New Year is finally here! 

With 2021 finally behind us, many of us are keeping our eyes on the future and focusing on things that are in our control. Oftentimes people set unrealistic New Year Resolutions for improving their life, ultimately falling short when things get difficult and life gets busy. It’s easy to resort to old habits and it's common for people to throw in the towel completely. In cases like these, the most important way to stick to your goals is to hold yourself accountable. With hundreds of apps to keep track of your fitness, screentime, or calorie intake, it can be overwhelming to stay up to date. Although, programming automated controls throughout your home can remind and motivate you to stay on track and achieve your goals. Below are some home automation suggestions to help you. 

Custom Audio Button

When life gets hectic many people rely on music or even meditation to help calm their mind and reset. Rather than fumbling trying to connect your device to your speakers, installing a specific button that is programmed to your favorite radio station or meditation channel can help ease tensions. Whether you want it to play throughout your entire Dallas home or only in a specific room, these controls can be customized to ensure you have immediate access to stress relief. 

Refreshed Lighting Scheme

You’ve made the decision to build a home, now where do you start? 

The process of building a new home is exciting and often overwhelming. You may feel pressure to perfect every inch because after all, you will be the one living in it. While planning the layout, exterior and interior design are crucial factors, the overall functionality of your Texas home is just as important. Identifying your technology needs is the first step to creating a smart home that will complement your lifestyle, rather than complicate it. Once you have outlined your needs, knowing the right questions to ask will lead you to the most efficient and automated home for you and your family. Hiring a specialist like us, to explain home automation topics to guide you through technology options will ensure you have all the answers to questions you didn’t know to ask, as well as help you achieve your smart home goals. Below are our recommendations for our most requested home technology features. 

Lighting

Creating a custom lighting scene is an essential part of improving productivity, security, and relaxation in your home. While most often, people focus on the overall design and look of their lighting scheme, we focus on the control of those lights. The ability to control your lights from your phone, a touch panel, remote, or the old-fashioned switch on the wall is the first of many automation controls in your new home. In this phase of planning, we recommend beginning in the most used areas of your home: family room, kitchen, hallways, etc… These areas of your home with the most traffic will be where you will want to have the most control on a daily basis. 

Installing control switches from Lutron or Control4 will allow you to turn the connected lights on and off and in most cases dim to the desired output. Although, many clients expand to include all the lights in their homes to be connected to one control system. We often hear how much of a relief it is to our clients that with the touch of a single button on the way out the door, they know that every light is turned off, even the kid’s closet!