HowTos

How To Get Blueprints of your Home to use for Projects

If you are considering a home project that requires plans of your home you might be wondering where do you go to get them.

If you are lucky and your home was built in the past 15 years or so the company that built your home may have included a set of plans when you bought the house. However it may cost you a few hundred dollars for a set because architects that design homes …

How To Fix A Brick Paver Patio that has Sinking Problems

One of our friends just had their brick patio repaired by a contractor and after about a week and some hard rain it seems that there is some out of level and sinking problems in the center of the patio.

He says that the patio is made from brick pavers laid in a basket weave pattern. The workers laid them on top tamped and leveled sand, and then filled sand in around them. After a …

How To Restore an Outside Plastic Bench that is Powdery and Oxidized

Today I decided I had a little extra time so I started looking for something to do to improve the front yard. Near my front door I have an Outside Bench that is made of heavy plastic. It is still in decent shape since it doesn’t see much use other than to be a place for the mailman to drop a package or once in a while I will go out and enjoy the …

How To Prevent Pests from Entering Your Home

In this How To a friend is asking about the best way to seal their foundation and areas at ground level to help prevent pests from entering their home.

We have crickets and mice during the summer so we need to fill the cracks between our siding and foundation. We tried to caulk it with polyurethane caulking.

Well at least they made an attempt and although its pretty ugly work it may help some. Unfortunately bugs …

How To Tips for Saving Money when Using an Electric Stove

If you grew up with a Gas Stove and have to Migrate to an Electric Stove or if you just have high costs from cooking we are going to give you a few really simple tips to save money while cooking.

With only a few exceptions will you find that Electric Range Cooking is up to the same service as Gas Ranges. And Cost in your area may depend on many factors so Gas may …

How To Replacing Vinyl Siding on very Old House

One of our friends writes that they own a home that was built around the 1890’s and that the previous owner had placed vinyl siding on it. After inspecting some water damage around a window they found that there was some caulking that had failed and some of the window sill and maybe some of the original wood under the siding has failed.

They are starting to get quotes about repairing and residing the entire …

How To Cure a Musty Smelling Clothes Washer

Musty smelling clothes washers are a problem that many people have. Unfortunately this problem happens not because we aren’t good care takers of our homes but because of residual water that remains in the washer after use.

This can be a very difficult problem to take care of because the bacteria that causes the smell will also cause your clean clothes to stink.

The amount of bleach that you might use in your whites is normally …

How To Avoid the Biggest mistakes of a Beginner Gardener

Over the past few months we have been talking with gardeners and asking them what are some of the biggest mistakes you made when you first got into Gardening.

This How To will cover some of them in hopes that you can avoid them.
Over Planting and Not Pruning
The first mistake that many people shared was that they didn’t give their vegetables enough room to grow. On your package of seeds or on your planing spikes …

How To Reduce Your Cable Internet Bill

If you are in an area that provides internet over your cable tv company’s line then you have probably looked at the costs involved. The first thing you should know is that if you are a large data user the major internet providers are going to limit your data download amount with what is called a Data Cap. Although there are FCC rules that force cable and phone providers to provide open access and …

How To Clean Up a Backyard Walkway and Concrete Steps

One of our friends asks about their backyard. Its spring and they recently purchased their home and they want to clean up the backyard and make it more usable. One of the projects they have in mind is an area around some concrete steps that are in disrepair and they want to connect the area between the steps and the patio so they aren’t walking on dirt to get into the backyard.

This is a …