Category: House and Home

Even More Top Tips for Handy Home Repairs

1. Close your sink stopper whenever you are repairing the faucet. It will prevent any small parts from falling down the drain. Extra tip: Get a little mesh drain cover (one of the ones that goes partly down the drain) or covers over the hole to stop any items from getting washed down and to help prevent clogs. Put one in your kitchen sink, and you will be shocked at how much debris collects each time you wash the dishes. Shake the debris out into your trash can and/or scoop it out with a spoon. Rinse and replace.

2. To prevent hitting your thumb or hand with the hammer, hold the nail in place with a pair of pliers with one hand, and hammer with the other. Do this when nailing into hard wood to help avoid bounce-back injuries. Holding it in position firmly in this manner can also prevent the nail from going in crookedly.

3. Pushing the tips of your nails or screws into a bar of soap or candle will lubricate them and make it easier to drive them into wood.

4. If the flames of your gas stove are uneven, the burner is most likely clogged. Turn off the stove, turn off the gas connection, and use a Q-tip with some baking soda and vinegar to clean around and inside each hole. Use a new Q-tip as needed until you’ve removed the cooked-on food and residue to clean each pore of the burner.

5. Save the handles of old brooms. They make great extension handles for paint rollers, or paint stirrers.

FURTHER READING:

How to Get Started as a Do-It-Yourself Mom

Your Greener Energy Guide: A Beginner’s Guide to Alternative Energy Production

How to Paint Your House Inside and Out

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Some More Handy Housekeeping Hints

1. You can reduce the time you need to clean your bathroom walls by steaming the bathroom first to soften the molds and other buildups sticking to the walls. As soon as you have finished showering, start cleaning!

2. To keep your garbage bins smelling fresh, place a cut-up lemon in it. The lemon scent will keep your kitchen smelling pleasant. You can also sprinkling baking soda into each trash bag to help absorb odors.

3. Remove pills and other fraying from sweaters and clothing by using a single-edged man’s razor. Shave as if you were shaving your face or legs. So long as you don’t press down, you won’t damage the wool or fabric.

4. Never store opened canned foods in the fridge. Transfer the contents into plastic or ceramic containers. The lead in the container can be absorbed in the food and cause illness. Be especially careful with tomatoes and other foods high in acidity.

5. Practice the first-in-first-out principle in the kitchen, especially with food items. Arrange your pantry items in such a way as to put the older purchases in the front or on the top.

6. Remove wallpaper easily with the help of vinegar and warm water. Mix equal parts of vinegar and warm water and roll it over the wall paper you want to remove using a paint roller, until the paper is thoroughly soaked. Repeat again about 30 minutes later. And wait 30 minutes more. The paper should peel off easily.

FURTHER READING:

Your Greener Energy Guide: A Beginner’s Guide to Alternative Energy Production

The Smart Woman’s Do-It-Yourself Guide to a Greener Home

The New Green Family Guide: A Beginner’s Guide to Going Green As a Family

Saving Money, Investing Wisely in 2012: Insider Secrets on How to Make the Most of Your Money in this Ongoing Recession

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More Top Tips for Handy Home Repairs

1. To minimize the need for repairing the toilet, flush a cup of baking soda into the bowl once a week. Baking soda controls the pH level in the septic tank that aids the flushing process.

2. Consider a tool that can do more tasks when deciding what power tool/s to buy. Consider cordless tools if you live in a large home.

3. If there is no penetrating oil available for emergency repairs, use soda or vinegar to loosen a stuck screw. Let the soda or vinegar seep into the hole for about 2 minutes, then try to turn it. If that does not work, sprinkle a small amount of baking soda and add a teaspoon of vinegar. The explosive foaming action will loosen it in no time. (Hint-Baking soda and vinegar is a very convenient home cleaning solution, but do NOT use on old pipes. You can blast a hole in them or make the pipes come apart at the seams.

4. To remedy a hole in a window screen in order to keep out insects, cut a piece of screen an inch bigger than the hole on all sides. Position the patch over the hole, unravel some of the wires from the piece you have cut the patch from, and weave the metal wires through both sets of screen openings until the patch is attached securely to the main screen and no bugs can sneak through.

5. Storing small pieces of chalk inside the toolbox can not only help you have some handy if you need to mark doors or walls when you are measuring or doing DIY projects. They can also absorb moisture which can rust tools over time, and therefore help you protect and preserve your investment.

FURTHER READING:

How to Get Started as a Do-It-Yourself Mom

Your Greener Energy Guide: A Beginner’s Guide to Alternative Energy Production

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Tips For House Repairs

1. Have a tube of all-purpose strong glue on hand for minor repairs. Also keep Teflon tape, electrical tape and sturdy double-sided tape on hand for piping, wiring and general repairs.

2. If you are working with wood and mis-judge your sides and cut it too short, cut the piece you have made in half and then make up the mismeasurement with a different piece of wood. If you wish, you can use a different shade of wood to create a decorative accent, or just stain the wood all one color so that few people will ever see your mistake.

3. To prevent paint from spilling all over the edge of the top of the paint can, punch holes all around the cover rim. When you swipe the brush against the rim, any excess paint that bubbles onto the rim will automatically drip back into the can.

4. When painting the house, wrap doorknobs with plastic bags and cover plate switches with masking tape to keep them free of paint splatters when repainting walls and doors. If you remove them, put them in separate plastic bags with their screws and any other fittings in order to avoid confusion. If you have a lot of these fixtures, consider writing the location where the items came from on an envelope and putting the plastic bag inside the envelope.

5. Old plastic shower curtains make handy protective drop cloths while working/painting to protect the floor from splutters and drips. After all, you are only going to throw them away anyway, so spray them with Lysol or another disinfectant and hang them for a day or so to be sure they are completely dry. Then fold them away and store them until your next paint job (which will usually be about every 3 years depending on the quality of the paint you use.

FURTHER READING:

How to Paint Your House Inside and Out

How to Get Started as a Do-It-Yourself Mom

How to Become a Do-It-Yourself Mom: A Guide for Simple Home Decorating Ideas for Smart Women

Your Greener Energy Guide: A Beginner’s Guide to Alternative Energy Production

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More Handy Housekeeping Hints

1. Make your own kitchen air freshener for the holidays. In a saucepan, bring a small amount of water to a boil and add cinnamon sticks and orange peel. Simmer under a low fire, and let the homey scent fill your kitchen. This will also work well with cloves instead of the cinnamon. For a fresh scent every day, use any discarded orange or lemon rinds you might have.

2. Do you have a child who wets the bed? Or a pet who has soiled his and you’re tired of washing the dog bed all the time? Remove nasty urine odors on mattresses with borax. Dampen the affected areas with cold water, and sprinkle borax over them. Rub the borax vigorously over the affected areas and let dry. Then brush off the remaining powder and it should be much fresher and cleaner.

3. Remove wallpaper easily with the help of vinegar and warm water. Mix equal parts of vinegar and warm water and roll it over the wall paper you want to remove using a paint roller, until the paper is thoroughly soaked. Repeat again about 30 minutes later. And wait 30 minutes more. The paper should peel off easily.

4. Place contrasting elements together to create a dramatic effect in a room. For example, if you have a glass and chrome table, group nicely upholstered chairs around it.

5. Mirrors are best cleaned with newspaper to prevent streaking. After wiping them with a rag soaked in soapy water, rinse and wipe dry with crumpled newspaper. The mirror should be squeaky clean, without any streaks.

6. Schedule once-a-week chores to save on time and electricity. Iron your whole week’s worth of clothes at the same time (while watching a movie, for example, to make the chore less tedious) instead of one piece at a time. De-frost all of your freezers at the same time once a month to keep them operating efficiently and to help sort them and check your log of what you have in each.Go to the supermarket once a week to save on fuel, and to shop the sales at the store.

7. To keep the kitchen free of spills and sticky drippings, transfer condiments, salad dressings, jelly and other messy items into plastic squeeze bottles, using a funnel to avoid spills. Keep the tips of the bottles clean and sanitary by wiping at the end of each use. Use a Q-tip if it really gets clogged.

FURTHER READING:

Your Greener Energy Guide: A Beginner’s Guide to Alternative Energy Production

The Smart Woman’s Do-It-Yourself Guide to a Greener Home

The New Green Family Guide: A Beginner’s Guide to Going Green As a Family

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Housekeeping Hints

1. A paste of butter and cigarette ashes do a good job of removing white water marks on wood. Spread onto the spot and rub with a damp cloth.

2. To prevent damage to delicate clothes when washing them inside a washing machine, place the garments inside a pillowcase and wash on the gentle cycle. This can help you save a great deal of money on dry cleaning. You can also freshen up wool sweaters in this way-it will actually do far less damage than trying to wash them by hand, since they will go through a spin cycle in the pillow case and not lose their shape due to the weight of the water in the wool stretching the fibers.

3. To remove crayon marks from your walls, try using a small smear of toothpaste on the marks. Leave it to stand for a minute, then rub off with a clean cloth.

4. Regularly set aside a time each year to clean out storage areas and take stock of what you have. Either keep it, or put it aside for a yard sale and/or charitable donation, or sell it on eBay. In this way you can keep your house clutter-free and easier to clean.

5. Make your own kitchen air freshener for the holidays. In a saucepan, bring a small amount of water to a boil and add cinnamon sticks and orange peel. Simmer under a low fire, and let the homey scent fill your kitchen. This will also work well with cloves instead of the cinnamon. For a fresh scent every day, use any discarded orange or lemon rinds you might have.

6. Do you have a child who wets the bed? Or a pet who has soiled his and you’re tired of washing the dog bed all the time? Remove nasty urine odors on mattresses with borax. Dampen the affected areas with cold water, and sprinkle borax over them. Rub the borax vigorously over the affected areas and let dry. Then brush off the remaining powder and it should be much fresher and cleaner.

FURTHER READING:

Saving Money, Investing Wisely in 2012: Insider Secrets on How to Make the Most of Your Money in this Ongoing Recession

Make and Freeze Recipes

More Make and Freeze Recipes

Even More Make and Freeze Recipes

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How to Become Familiar with Your Pipes and Drains

One of the worst things that can happen to a homeowner is a water pipe breaking. A broken or cracked water pipe can cause significant damage inside your home if you don’t know where the leak is coming from and can’t stop it.

One of the main issues with locating the leak is the fact that there are so many pipes in your home. Most people are not familiar with their pipes and drains and so it can be hard to know exactly where the water is dripping from in order to be able to tighten or replace the correct pipe.

Because of the amount of time that it takes to locate leaks, in many cases, unnecessary damage occurs and can result in even more expense in terms of repairs and the time it will take to clean up the mess.

You may have just moved into a new home, or you may have been living in the same location for years. Regardless, if you are not already familiar with the pipes and drains in your home, it might be time to start familiarizing yourself with them, and giving them a periodic check from time to time.

The first thing you can do to become more familiar with your pipes is to locate or create a diagram of the plumbing layout of your house. You might have been given one by your realtor, or you can create one easily by indicating each drain, bathroom and sink.

Also indicate where the access openings are, if any, so that it will be easy to trace leaking pipes that need to be tightened or replaced, or help you deal with clogged drains.

If you have built a new home, the process of mapping pipes can be easy and you should ask your general contractor or your plumbing contractor to create a diagram for you. Also ask if it is possible to keep in mind easy access around sinks and drains just in case the worst should happen.

If you have purchased or live in an older home, you may want to spend the money to hire a professional to map out your pipes and drains and check on their overall condition. While this can cost you time and money initially, it can save you a good deal of both if the worst were ever to happen. Being proactive and repairing the worst of the old pipes before they burst one winter and cause flooding can save you hundreds, if not thousands of dollars, and being invaded by mold and mildew.

Most people don’t think about their pipes and plumbing-until it is too late. Don’t be short-sighted. Hope for the best, but plan for the worst. Know where all of your main pipes and drains are before you ever have a problem. Have a diagram made of all your pipes and drains and check them periodically.

Ask a professional to assess your pipes if they are very old. If you have been having trouble with leaks, get the plumber in to check them and decide what to do based on what you can afford. Just remember, water can cause a great deal of damage in your home, and any floors and ceilings under the leaking pipes, so don’t be penny-wise and pound-foolish when it comes to keeping your plumbing up to date and in good repair.

FURTHER READING:

How to Become a Do-It-Yourself Mom: A Guide for Simple Home Decorating Ideas for Smart Women
DIY MOM

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