Hi @bsrabian: Congratulations on your home improvement project! Sounds like fun. Here is a shameless plug for the Category Schedule as a tool to plan the expenses of the project 
Using it, here’s another approach: To keep your cash flow plan positive for the year after budgeting for your home improvements, you’ll need to bring the anticipated proceeds from the HELOC into your budget as an income source (lump sum at the beginning of the project since your draw down may be unknown) equal to the sum of the proposed expenses for the same time period that you plan to finance (you may pay for some of the improvements from in your non-HELOC cash flow? 
). The sum of your budget lines for the improvements in the year and the lump sum from the HELOC amount should equal if you will finance them all. Don’t hide any of these category lines. Then, what you’re really budgeting and managing is your capacity and pace to repay the loan. Create a budget line for your HELOC payments plan (not hidden) to be sure you can continue to service the debt with your annual cash flow that is separate from the loan.
Does that make sense? It is a little more work, but these steps provide you with the tools to manage your expenses AND manage your repayments, keeping strong records of all.
Happy building!