Author: Katelyn Thomas

If you’re not quite ready to move or you have given up on selling your home for a few years until the market recovers, why not try one of these small home improvement projects to make you feel happier about the house you have? A little project can make a room look a lot nicer and you can always do another little project in the same room a few months later. Repeat the process long enough and you’ll eventually have a new room. (And you won’t have a $20,000 loan out on the project, either.)

• Replace your shabby old hall carpet with laminate flooring. Unless you have a mini mansion, your hall will be small enough that you can keep your costs on this project nice and low.
• Take advantage of rebates and government incentives to replace a dented and worn kitchen or laundry room appliance. Cash for Appliances, which was supposed to start at the end of 2009, is now slated to start in March 2010 for many states.
• Paint a wall. If you have a room that needs some color, you can try painting just one wall to make a focal point and leave the rest white or beige. Even with top quality paint and a great brush, you can do this project for under $100.
• Add some nice moulding to a room. Chair rail can add a lot of interest very cheaply. Just be sure you make your miter cuts in the right direction. (Yes, I’m telling you this from sad, sad experience.)
• Switch out hardware on kitchen cupboard doors or the doors throughout your house. Changing out exterior door hardware has the added bonus of increasing safety and security if you upgrade to better locks and add deadbolts.

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Post from: Blisstree

Five Little Home Improvement Projects for 2010

I may not wear clothes made from duct tape or create gifts to give to family members out of it, but I sure do love this versatile home improvement product! Duct tape can really help keep things tidy. Here are just a few ways I use duct tape to keep my home organized:

• Tape down cords. As I mentioned in a home safety tips article, taping down cords helps prevent people from tripping and injuring themselves
• Keep things that fall over where they belong. A little piece of tape keeps stuff like computer speakers or the Funkey starter kit critter on the kids’ computer desks, even when they are being a little vigorous with their mice. I don’t know how many times I picked them off the floor and stuck them back on the desks before I taped them down.
• Reinforce flimsy organizer hinges. A lot of little containers have one little seam of plastic holding the lids on. I’ve discovered that running a piece of tape along the hinge on the outside of heavily used containers helps them last longer.
• Keep containers fastened. If you have a container lid that is a bit loose, duct taping it shut makes it very secure.

Do you use duct tape to keep things neat around the house?

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Post from: Blisstree

Duct Tape Is an Organizer’s Friend

I got my coupon inserts today and they were covered in reminders that it is time to clean out the medicine cabinet. While the manufacturers are hoping that a lot of customers throw out expired items and run out to buy new products, their reminder is a good one. Cleaning out the medicine cabinet helps you avoid using expired products and it also is a good way for you to limit the number of potential dangerous drugs in your home. (Remember, just because it comes with a prescription doesn’t mean it is safe for someone who doesn’t have a prescription to take. Some teens raid their family medicine cabinets to get high, often with deadly consequences.)

Begin by removing everything from the cabinet. Sort all the expired medications into one pile, the unexpired medications you don’t take any more into another pile and everything you still want into a third pile. Put everything you still want back in the cabinet. Make a list of any expired medications you want to replace, as well as any other items you are running low on, like bandages or peroxide.

Dispose of all your unwanted medications properly. After the government realized the effect all those medications going down the drain has on our environment, it has changed the recommendation to flush old medication or pour it down the drain. Unless the medication is on the list of items that still should be flushed, you should follow the SMARxT Disposal Plan, which encourages people to put medications in a sealed plastic bag along with kitty litter or something else gross and put it in the trash.

Are you cleaning out your medicine cabinet this month?

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Post from: Blisstree

Time to Clean Out the Medicine Cabinet

Oh, rats. The toaster is making a disgusting burned smell every time you use it, but your toast isn’t burnt after it pops up. There must be something stuck in the toaster somewhere and you need to clean it. The whole process is pretty easy, but I’ve seen a couple people do some scary and dangerous things, so I thought a review of how to clean a toaster might be helpful.

• Unplug the toaster. This is your first step and should be the first step before you mess around with any appliances. An awful lot of people just shove a butter knife on in the toaster to unjam a piece of burnt bread or bagel and get a nice little jolt of electricity.
• Take the toaster over to the trash can and turn it upside down over the can. (Some crumbs will probably fall out, which is why it makes sense to do this over the can.)
• Open the little door on the bottom of the toaster and turn the toaster right side up over the trash can. Tap the toaster gently to get out all the loose crumbs.
• If the outside of the toaster is dirty, wipe down the surface with a damp rag to remove grease or grime. Never put the toaster in a sink full of soapy water. If it is too dirty to clean without immersing it in water, it may be time to buy a new toaster.
• Shut the toaster’s bottom door and set it back up.

Do you have any additional tips for safely cleaning a toaster?

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Post from: Blisstree

How to Clean a Toaster

My sister grabbed her crock pot lid to stick it on the pot filled with her delicious meatballs. It slipped from her hand and shattered all over the her floor. Luckily, it was the lid instead of the pot filled with meatballs and sauce, so she only had to clean up glass all over the floor instead of sauce and glass. But her crock pot is no longer usable. So, does she toss it and buy another pot? Use the pot insert as a planter or a jar to hold little odds and ends? How about just getting a replacement lid?

That’s right. Most crock pot brands, including the original Crock-Pot, sell replacement parts, from lid handles to lids themselves. Unfortunately, by the time I heard the whole tragic tale, she’d already tossed her old crock pot, so she’s going to have to buy a new one instead of just getting a new lid for about $10. To search for replacement parts for your crock pot, you should know the brand and model number. This information is almost always found on the bottom of the crock pot. Then, head to the company site to see if there is a replacement parts section. My search at Rival’s website redirected me to crock-pot.com, which had a replacement parts section. If you don’t see an option to get replacement parts for your hot pot brand, do a quick search for replacement part companies and buy your part through one of them.

Have you ever had a crock pot lid tragedy?

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Post from: Blisstree

Cracked Crock Pot Lids and Other Sad Tales

Coat racks and hat racks are very functional things to have in a home. I have one by the back door that is low enough for kids to hang their gear on and one on the other side that is great for hanging leashes and stuff to grab on the way out the door. Coat racks can be a bit pricey, especially if you want something more than those wooden racks you paint yourself from the local craft store. I like to make my own racks because it is such a simple thing to do and they look really unique.

To make a coat rack or hat rack, you will need:

• Three or four individual hooks. I found a set of iron sheep, a set of scotties and a ton of other themed hooks. If you want a rustic country look, I’ve seen people use sets of antique door knobs or outdoor faucets as their hooks.
• A piece of a nice shelf board. I use a board that is five to six inches wide by 12-14 inches long.
• Paint and brush
• Pencil
• A drill with a drill bit and a screw bit.
• Picture frame hanger kit.

Prime and paint your shelf board. Space the hooks out on the board until you like the way they look. Mark the hooks’ screw holes with the pencil. Remove the hooks so you can drill the holes. Turn the board over and install your picture frame hangers. Flip it back over and screw the hooks in. That’s it! No cookie cutter racks for you.

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Post from: Blisstree

Make Your Own Hat Racks

I frequently write up lists of things you should do when you are cleaning your house. However, a list of don’ts is equally important and, in some cases, a matter of life and death. Here are five things you should never do when cleaning your house.

• Mixing bleach and ammonia – It isn’t just an old wives’ tale. Mix these two cleansers and you’ll make a deadly gas. It is so deadly that it was actually used in warfare. Read every cleanser bottle before you use it and be careful not to use one that lists bleach and one that lists ammonia at the same time. (Even people who should know better sometimes forget about the danger of mixing the different cleaners. A friend of mine saved her unconscious housekeeper’s life when the housekeeper mixed the two. She glanced into the bathroom as she was walking by and saw the housekeeper collapsed on the floor. She covered her face with a towel, dragged the unconscious housekeeper from the bathroom and called 911.)
• Cleaning the toaster or any other appliance while it is plugged in – Some people think that if you haven’t hit the on switch, there’s no power going to the appliance. That is simply not always true. Play it safe and pull the plug.
• Cleaning things by hand without gloves – I didn’t really think about how important it is to avoid handling all the cleansers without gloves until I caught an episode of a tv talk show that had a dying woman on there who had an obsessive compulsive disorder with a cleaning problem. She was literally killing herself with all the constant scrubbing and scouring because the cleaners were getting into her body. So, wear those plastic yellow gloves and use tools that help you avoid coming in contact with chemicals. (Or go green, which is what I prefer to do. I have to use more elbow grease to get the results I want, but vinegar, baking soda, lemon juice and other natural products can make things sparkle just as much as toxic chemicals do.)
• Keeping rooms closed up after you’ve cleaned with non-green cleansers – If new research shows that using air fresheners can be unhealthy for us, imagine what ammonia or bleach does for our air quality. Air out you rooms.
• Leave cleansers and other chemicals out unattended or leave them sitting in sinks or toilets – If you have kids or pets, you should always be sure to put containers away with the lids securely on and should make sure you don’t leave cleaners in sinks and toilets. No matter how hard we try to prevent it, cats and dogs drink out of toilets. Kids splash in “pretty” sink water. People knock over containers. Stay safe and keep your family safe by putting stuff away.

Do you have any tips for things you should avoid when you are cleaning your house?

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Post from: Blisstree

Five Things You Should Never Do When Cleaning Your House

January can be a cold and rainy month for many people. Cabin fever begins to set in and they stare longingly out the windows at the brown and shriveled gardens. Wow. That window is a bit grimy looking, isn’t it? While you don’t necessarily want to clean your windows inside and out, this is the ideal time to clean the inside window glass if you didn’t get around to getting them all nice and clean in the warmer months. (You might also discover that you overlooked a few storm windows. Time to slide them down, too.) Here are a few other January home maintenance tasks you can do:

• Check for spots in the yard where puddles covered in ice form. They are low spots and, if they are in high traffic areas, they could be dangerous. Fill them in to keep the water from settling there.
• Make sure the furnace filter is clean. If you changed it right before you turned the furnace on for the winter months, it has been cleaning the air for several months and may be pretty dirty.
• Take a look at all the appliances and gadgets you use heavily in the winter, like humidifiers and heaters. This can help you catch problems like moldy filters in the humidifier or a frayed cord on the heater.
• Vacuum all the heat register grates. They’ve been working full time to help you keep warm and you want to be sure no dust or debris is blocking them.
• Vacuum your fridge coils and clean out your fridge and freezer. It is a good idea to take all the shelves and drawers out of the fridge to really clean them a few times a year and starting off the new year without moldy leftovers or freezer burned mystery meat just seems like a nice thing.
• Go through the house and make a checklist of chores for warmer months. This way, you won’t forget about the chipped paint behind the bread maker when you have a nice warm Spring day perfect for painting.
• Think about improvements you want to make for the summer and whether you can do them now. For example, if you have a few nice days in a row this month, you can screen the porch so it will be ready for you to enjoy right away during warm weather.

Do you have any other January cleaning or home maintenance tasks you do?

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Post from: Blisstree

January Housekeeping and Home Maintenance Tasks

I admit I am fascinated by the Monster Garage tv show. Those garages are usually nicer than the houses they are beside! Unfortunately, for normal people with normal budgets, a garage that is that fancy and sleek is a dream that isn’t likely to come true. That doesn’t mean you can’t do some renovations and reorganization to make your garage a nice place to visit, though.

• Stop letting the garage by the dumping ground. If you don’t want something enough to keep it in the prime storage space in your home, you probably just want to take it to your local thrift store instead of piling it in the garage. If you do have things to store in the garage, such as holiday decorations, relegate them to one corner and make sure everything is in a neatly labeled storage bin placed on a shelving unit or in a cupboard.
• Consider painting your concrete floor. If your floor is cracked and stained, you can patch your cracks, clean the floor and then apply a coat of epoxy paint. (From experience, I can tell you that this is a smelly, kind of messy project and not for the faint of heart, but the end result can really look nice.)
• Paint the walls. I have seen so many garages with the original unpainted drywall. A nice deep blue or gray blue color would improve the room’s appearance a lot. Use glossy paint so you can wipe off dirt more easily. You should expect to have to repaint more frequently than you do in the house because a garage can be a greasy, grimy place when you’re messing around with your car or motorcycle.
• Add a seating area, even if it is just a stool in front of the cabinets along one wall, so someone who is visiting while you are working can hang out. If you have a one and a half or two and a half car garage, you should have enough space to add a vinyl upholstered chair or two. Have some extra cash? Shop around for a good deal on a flat screen tv, mount it on the opposite wall and you’ll never want to leave.
• Use car or motorcycle parts as wall art. A group of steering wheels, license plates, or filters can add plenty of interest.

Do you have any tips for sprucing up a garage without spending too much cash?

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Post from: Blisstree

Garage Renovations for Normal Budgets

Many Christmas accessories are covered in snowflakes, snowmen and Santas. They definitely look out of place in the middle of summer. Other items, like a solid green or red tablecloth, have year round appeal and can be as much as 90% off at after Christmas sales. Shopping at these sales for items you can use year round is a smart way to stretch your budget. Here are a few things I picked up for my house this year at a Target 50% off sale:

• Pretty teal cereal bowls – They do have snowmen in the bottom, but no one will even notice til after their oatmeal is gone. The outside of the bowl is solid blue.
• Napkins and tablecloths in solid colors.
• Paper towels – I could care less if I’m mopping up something gross with a snowman print in the middle of July. (We do try to use rags as much as possible to cut costs and be more eco-friendly, but there are still things I’d like paper towels for.)
• Grocery items like cake mixes and cookie mixes – Holiday cake mixes taste and look an awful lot like the funfetti mixes we use to make birthday cupcakes. Sugar cookies can be cut with Easter cookie cutters and won’t like a bit Christmasy.
• Reynold’s wrap – Foil is foil.

What things do you like to pick up at after Christmas sales?

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Post from: Blisstree

Shop After Christmas Sales for Year Round Household Items

Every year, most people make a whole list of New Year’s resolutions. Then, they stick to them for about a week. A lot of the time, they break resolutions because they are impossible to keep without concentrating all of their time and energy on that single resolution. So, let’s make ours realistic. Here are five New Year’s resolutions to make that aren’t too hard, but will help you have a more organized and enjoyable year:

1. Throw away or donate at least one thing every week. I always resolve to sort out entire rooms from top to bottom and never seem to make it through all of them. One thing as I walk through a room each week is completely doable. Of course, if you have a big family with a lot of stuff, you might want to make it a daily resolution instead of a weekly one!
2. Label everything. I have most of my bins organized, but there’s always one I forgot to label. Having to open it up just so you can recall what is in it is a waste of time and energy.
3. Use baskets and bins to corral clutter. When you have kids that are packrats, it can be hard to have enough bins and baskets so make sure to use this resolution in conjunction with number one! I use hair stuff baskets, mail baskets, to scrapbook baskets, school paper baskets, tiny toy baskets, etc.
4. Clean one thing you don’t normally clean each week. A window, a ceiling fan, an air vent. By the end of the year, you’ll have cleaned 52 things at least once.
5. Enlist help. If you don’t already have one, set up a chore system for your family members and have them help out. One person shouldn’t be still scrubbing toilets at 10 pm while everyone else is wrapping up their Die Hard movie marathon and only stirred from the sofa to get more snacks about three hours ago! Resolving to give your chores frees up some of your time and helps them learn life skills they’ll be happy to have when they are grownups living on their own.

What housekeeping New Year’s resolutions will you be making this year?

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Post from: Blisstree

Five Housekeeping New Years Resolutions to Make

I like to take a look around for places to use for storage and am a big fan of the Wasted Spaces television show, which had a lot of great tips for utilizing space you already have for storage. My first house was the poster child for their television show, with tons of built ins and cubbies. It was only two bedrooms and very small in square footage, but I actually had more storage space than I needed and never even looked in my attic space.

From there, I moved to a house that had virtually no storage and, boy, did I miss my tiny house. If you have all the square footage in the world and you don’t have shelving and cupboards, you can feel more disorganized and cluttered than you did in a lot less space. So, I began a hunt for storage space. Here are five of my favorite places to put storage:

• Under a bench – I have five matching baskets tucked under my hall bench, which is about six feet long. The baskets are really handy and hold shoes, gardening stuff, etc. in a very organized fashion. Guests walking into the house see five tidy baskets instead of a bunch of loose stuff.
• Under the stairs – We have a small closet under the higher stair treads in the hallway. I lined it with narrow shelves and now I have space for all my canned goods. (There wasn’t a pantry, probably because the former owners flipped the living room and kitchen around and who builds a house with a pantry beside their living room in 1902?)
• On top of cabinets – Some people like to build their cabinets in or choose cabinets that go up to the ceiling. I like that extra foot of space empty so I can put vintage pottery and a few other display pieces up. If you do have a soffit, you can still take advantage of the space by putting in a narrow piece of plate rail molding to display some of your favorite plates.
• Under beds – Just putting some boxes under your bed can make things less organized instead of tidier. Putting an under bed system with pull out drawers under the bed is a whole new experience.
• Inside furniture – Choose a footstool that holds blankets or toys, an island with drawers and cupboards, etc.

Where do you find unexpected storage opportunities?

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Post from: Blisstree

Five Places You Can Use for Storage

You stand and gaze at the ocean of new things filling your home and shake your head. Despite the fact that you were determined to keep Christmas low key and commercial this year, the three gifts each and one group gift you got your children have morphed into around 30 gifts each as each relative stopped by with just  a few gifts for each child. How are you supposed to organize all of the stuff filling your home? Here are a few tips that work for us:

• Ask children to sort through toys and clothing for things that they don’t want anymore. After getting so many new things, they’ll probably be willing to part with things they haven’t used in awhile. You can donate some of the items and take the others to your consignment shop.
• Set up a storage bin for each child so they can fill the bins with toys they don’t want to get rid of, but don’t plan to play with for awhile. You can stick the bins in storage, making room for their new toys.
• Set up bins for yourself, too. Label them with store, toss and donate. As you take down holiday decorations over the next week or so, put each decoration immediately into one of the bins. You can then go through the store bin and organize the decorations you are keeping into storage containers with like items. (If you’re an ornamentaholic like me, sorting the two thousand Shiny Brite ornaments you seem to have acquired into the right containers is essential for staying sane while putting decorations up the next year.)
• If you have a lot of decorations, but still plan to hit the after Christmas sales to stock up on new decorations for next year, consider deciding to donate or sell one old decoration for every new decoration you bring home.

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Post from: Blisstree

After Christmas Organizing Tips

If you are looking for something to do with the family today, don’t forget about tracking Santa with Norad. He’s been in several locations already today, from North Pole islands, to Australia and New Zealand and then up to Japan. You can watch the videos of Norad spotting Santa at the different locations and you can explore the North Pole village.

I especially love all the military guys imparting news of Santa’s arrival and discussing different technical aspects of his journey, like the way they can figure out his speed by knowing how fast the Japanese train goes.

If you’re still looking for something to do while you track Santa’s progress, you can find quite a few other online activities:

• For Webkinz owners, there are a ton of Christmas things to do. Santakinz is still in the Webkinz clubhouse, taking last minute Christmas wishes from all the little Webkinz and Mrs. Birdy is giving out a treat in different rooms of the clubhouse.
• Facebook games almost all seem to have Christmas gifts, decorations, etc.
• Bellasara has a Winter festival going on.
• PetPetPark has a massive Winter festival.
• You can Elf Yourself.
• North Pole has a lot of holiday games, like dressing a snowman.

What is your favorite online hangout on Christmas eve?

Post from: Blisstree

Tracking Santa on Christmas Eve

You’re heading out the door and you realize that you don’t have a gift to give to the hostess of the party you will be attending. You only have a few minutes to throw something together, but you don’t want it to look thrown together. What can you bring? I do have a gift closet that I keep stocked with nice little things I pick up throughout the year, but sometimes I have the same problem. Here are five last minute gifts your hostess will appreciate:

• A gift card for Amazon.com – You can print the card out instead of just emailing it, which gives you a tangible item to hand to your hostess.
• Gift in a jar – I always have a few clean jars sitting around for just this sort of thing. It really only takes a few minutes to print out the recipe, layer the ingredients in a pre-cleaned jar and to tie a pretty ribbon on it. 
• Coupon book – Print out a set of coupons, cut a cardstock cover to fit and bind them with pretty ribbons. Coupons can be something as simple as an offer to babysit for an hour so the hostess can work out at the gym kid free or a promise to go on a Starbucks and pastries run on a Sunday morning.
• Gift basket – Sometimes, none of the items in my gift closet are quite enough by themselves. However, if I put a box of nice tea, that cute mug and an inspirational book together in a basket, they add up to a nice gift.
• Spafinder gift certificate – Something the hostess will really be able to use after putting together a party. Because you can print out a certificate, you can have the gift in hand in a few minutes.

Do you have any great last minute hostess gift ideas?

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Post from: Blisstree

Five Last Minute Hostess Gifts for the Holidays

Have you ever noticed that the corners of your rooms are dirtier than the rest of the house? Maybe it is because vents and breezes blow things around until they land in the corner, never to move again. Well, at least not until you vacuum them up the next day. Today, I’m cleaning all of my corners after yesterday’s big “I’m bored. What can I do? Can I do the vacuuming?” event, because they got missed and I didn’t want to re-clean in front of my helpers. (Children and some grownups tend to clean right in the middle of a room without thinking about the fact that the space under the sofa or that corner over there needs to be vacuumed, too.)So, why did I wait until the next day to do the job right?

Going right behind helpers and re-cleaning isn’t a good way to make them feel capable and useful. Since you have children help with household chores to teach responsibility, to build stronger families and to do any number of other good things, you don’t want to undo all the good by destroying their self esteem and making them feel inadequate. Instead, you may want to wait until they are in school to clean your corners properly. Then, guide them to clean those areas by modeling the right way to do it another day.

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Post from: Blisstree

Tidy Tuesday – Clean Your Corners

There are some major bargains on repo homes right now and a lot of people searching for their first home are very attracted by prices that seem too good to be true. Some of these homes really are a good deal. Some are overwhelming wrecks that will empty your bank account and make you sick before you end up getting them properly repaired. So, before you decide you want to buy a repo home, you need to know what you are getting into.

The biggest issue with repo homes is that most banks turn off the utilities. Then, most of those same banks don’t winterize the homes. So, you have a house with a damp basement, no sump pump running and…oops. Guess they didn’t drain the pipes. The water in them expanded and they burst. Someone’s going to be in for a nasty surprise when they turn the utilities back on. Maybe they’ll notice the broken pipes when they rip the walls down to the studs to get rid of the black mold spreading through the home because of the water in the basement and it won’t be too much of a problem.

You think I’m exaggerating, right? I didn’t take a picture of the house I was just in. I wish I would have. At first glance, it looked like there was black flocked wallpaper all over the house. Literally all over. Under the stairs. Up the walls. Across the ceilings. Fuzzy, fuzzy, black stuff. And the smell of the mold was enough to knock you out. It was such a cute little house in a great neighborhood, but anyone buying it would have to call in a team of specialists to tear it down to the four outer walls and then hope the mold didn’t come back when they redid it all. Damp basement, no winterization and the sump pump was off.

I have no idea why they don’t properly winterize and why they don’t do something to keep a sump pump running. There have to be some sort of battery powered pumps or something out there. But they don’t. So, a $300,000 house is suddenly only worth the lot it is sitting on and the bank will accept an offer less than the value of the lot because they know no one except an experienced flipper with his or her own crew wants to deal with tearing down the mold filled house.

(Some banks do care about the properties and do keep the sump pump running or at least winterize the pipes. HUD always winterizes homes so, as long as the basement is dry, they are usually in good shape.)

Next, you’ll want to take a good look at the overall condition of the home. If it is an older house, it often needs resided, replacement windows, a new roof, updated electricity, etc. This makes sense. After all, if the previous owners were struggling to make house payments for several years, they probably also didn’t have the cash to keep the house up.

A final thing you have to consider is that, since the houses are usually in poor shape, you won’t be able to get conventional financing. You’ll probably have to qualify for a rehab loan, so you need to be sure the purchase price of the home plus the quotes for rehab you get from a contractor or two don’t go over the amount you are qualified to borrow.

So, why would anyone look at repo homes? Because after you look at the twentieth or thirtieth house, you realize you’re looking at your dream home. And, miracle of miracles, the house is winterized and there is no mold. The price, even with the work you’ll need to do, is affordable, especially if you put in a lot of sweat equity.

Have you ever purchased a repo home?

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Post from: Blisstree

Is a Repo Home Right for You?

Sidewalks are wonderful things to have when you’re strolling around the block. When you’re faced with a long, snow covered expanse that you need to shovel, not so much. Unless your town or city decides to tear it up to widen roads or install pipes, all sidewalk maintenance is usually the responsibility of the home owner.

To make sure you don’t end up with an expensive sidewalk replacement job, keep a close eye on the concrete. If you see any small cracks or chips, you should repair them right away. The easiest way to do this is to clean any debris out of the crack and refill it with concrete repair epoxy. The epoxy mixes up fairly easily and sets quickly.

For larger repairs, plan to spend more time and energy. Bigger cracks need to be enlarged a bit and moistened so that the old and new concrete will make a sturdy bond. (Kind of like the way you put handles on the clay coil pots everyone seems to make in elementary school art classes.) Make sure you completely fill the crack with the concrete repair product you chose. If you used a premixed concrete patch product or just mixed up a small batch of concrete on your own, let it sit a bit before smoothing it out. Depending on the size of the crack, you may also need to follow regular concrete curing instructions, which means covering the repaired area with plastic for a few days. (I didn’t do that the first time around and ended up with another crack in my repaired sidewalk.)

Have you ever tried repairing your sidewalk?

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Post from: Blisstree

Home Safety – Sidewalk Maintenance

People slip and fall constantly in their homes. Some falls can be prevented. Some can’t. Making sure you take the proper precautions to reduce the chance of someone falling and injuring him or herself in your home is a smart idea and fairly easy to do.

One of the simplest ways to cut down on accidents is to make sure that cable, phone and extension cords are all neatly tucked out of the way. Most companies require technicians to run cords around the edges of a room or under a rug. If you decide to add another tv set to your home, make sure you do the same thing. If you don’t have a rug and want to run a cable straight across a room, make sure you tape it securely down so it isn’t so easy for people to catch a foot in.

Another way to stay safe at home is to add slip proof decals to your tub or shower bottom. Outside the shower or tub, make sure you have a rug with a slip proof backing. (I know. You’ve heard that piece of advice a thousand times before. But do you have slip proof decals in the bottom of your tub?)

Get a claw tool and use it to reach things that are too high for you to get to easily. Standing on your toes on a swivel stool to try to reach something? Not safe. Standing on the ground and using a claw to firmly grasp and move the item? A lot safer.

Use step stools or step ladders properly. Make sure they are fully opened and level. Don’t stand on top of a step ladder to reach another inch or so. Have someone nearby to steady your ladder.

Use tape or treads on stairs to lessen the chance that someone will slip on the stairs. Make sure that all toys and other belongings are kept off the stairs.

Do you have any tips for minimizing slip and fall problems?

Photo: SXC

Post from: Blisstree

Home Safety – Minimizing Slip and Fall Problems