Filed under: Home Improvement | Tags: brickwork, cleaning, doors, window frames, windows
Readers of my DIY blog may be surprised to hear about how much difference some simple cosmetic changes to the overall appearance to your house both inside and out can improve the overall look, personal impression and even the value of your home. I’m talking about the really simple things like making sure that your brick or stonework is well maintained and clean – which may sound an obvious point but you would be surprised the difference it can make. You can have the brickwork of your house professionally power sprayed to remove any grime and mold and also get your smelly gutters cleaned for reasonable rates. Also, ensuring that your doors and window fittings are well kept, painted and varnished (if they are wooden) and nicely cleaned is another simple but effective way of improving your house. Even hiring out your local window cleaners can be an excellent cost effective way of giving your home that little sparkle that can make it stand out from the crowd. So take pride in your appearance, because when it comes to first impressions of houses – they always count!
Filed under: Bathrooms, Home Improvement | Tags: bathroom tips, Bathrooms, cleaning, showers
Here’s a few more home improvement tips for your bathroom suites that I’ve been trying out recently. They rally are straightforward to use and can save you time and effort while cleaning (because nobody likes to scrub!) Please let me know your experiences with these and offer any other helpful DIY advice you know as I’m always looking for new tips to publish on this blog! For example, a good way to prevent damp accumulating in all bathrooms is wiping down and drying all the surfaces and shower curtain – indeed anywhere that gets wet when you bathe or shower – straight after you finish. This simple but quick tip can save you hours of scrubbing horrible damp and mould later on in the month. Also please make sure that your bathroom has good ventilation – I cannot emphasise this enough. If your bathroom is in the basement make sure you get extractor fans fitted to allow the steam to escape.
Filed under: Home Furnishings, Home Improvement | Tags: bed, bedding, cleaning, Dust Mites, House
A lot of US based readers of this weblog have been getting in contact with me recently asking for tips on how to how to kill dust mites. It seems these little terrors are much more of an issue on your side of the pond – probably because of the warmer climate over there. Although I must confess I am no expert on the subject, I have read that the tiny dust mite is commonly found in household dust and can also get into your bedding. It has also been linked with potentially contributing to some health issues such as asthma – no wonder you guys don’t want them in your house! Unfortunately it seems they are also notoriously hard to get rid, but I have read that they can be removed from bed sheets by washing them at high temperatures. The article I stumbled upon above has further useful tips to address the issue.
Filed under: Home Improvement, gardening | Tags: cleaning, environment, House, Septic Tanks
My latest little piece of home improvement advice covers a rather smelly issue that is affecting our living environments in and around the home – the rather unsavoury topic of addressing effective ways of maintaining septic tanks. Ok, not a nice topic to tackle in any home improvement blog I hear you say – but unfortunately this is not a laughing matter. Indeed, a recent statement to the US congress has suggested that home owners failing to look after or properly maintain their residential septic systems have the potential of causing lasting damage to the surrounding environment by contaminating the areas ground water and potentially posing a health risk to your home. It is therefore naturally essential to properly maintain and clean your septic tanks.
Filed under: Bathrooms | Tags: air freshener, Bathroom, bleach, cleaning, mirrors, toilet, window sill
Hello DIY blog fans! At last I have had to bite the proverbial bullet and clean my disgusting bathroom. The site of green mould growing on the window sills was probably the turning point – plus the fact my friends and family were beginning to refuse to come round to my house! A word of warning for anyone taking on such a task – buy some marigolds! These cleaning gloves are not too attractive but they are the only way of saving you from the filth and grime of bathroom germs. Also, get plenty of bleach for the toilet and a good spray cleaner and lots of cloths/rags for the bathroom surfaces and mirrors. I also invested in some new bacteria neutralising air fresheners to mask the unholy smells from within. Cleaning the bathroom took around an hour but now it’s like having a complete new unit put in – I have gone from disgusting mould and limescale to something that I would be proud to display to the whole neighbourhood!
Filed under: gardening | Tags: cleaning, Compost, Home Improvement, weeding
Well, the sun shone all weekend and I was finally able to do a load of jobs around the garden which have been in the back of my mind since I moved into the house. As I had hoped, it really has been a busy weekend of gardening and DIY. After waking up late on Saturday morning with an inevitable self inflicted headache from heavy boozing the night before, I pulled on the old DIY overalls and set about trimming the huge hedges that overshadow the back garden and block off what little sunlight is available in this country. With the help of a lengthly step ladder secured by a friend (remember health and safety matters kids) I gingerly scaled the heights of this impressive evergreen monster. As I can’t afford (and probably don’t feel safe using) a chainsaw I had a lenghtly task on my hands trimming the hedges with hand held tools such as garden sheers. After a lengthly bit of tree trimming, I dispose of the newly cut branches by starting a compost heap in the corner of the garden. Compost heaps are an excellent way of disposing of green waste, because as they rot down they provide an excellent fertiliser for growing plants and save on money by reducing on trips to the dump or skip.
The next task in the garden was weeding the lawn, as there was seemingly more nasty weeds in their than grass! I prefer not to use and poisons or weedkiller around the garden though, as this can cause harm to birds and other animals which I wan’t to avoid – plus substances such as this can also be quite expensive. For this reason I had no other choice than to get my hands dirty again and get stuck into the lawn with a trowel. A good tip to remember when doing this is to make sure you dig out the roots of the weeds, otherwise they keep growing back! i also throw the weeds onto the compost heap to rot down.
The final job was to do a bit of home improvement and other cleaning around the house, as the house party the night before had left the place looking like a bomb had hit it. I relunctantly start cleaning up all the empty bottles and cans into rubbish bags, then get out the vacuum cleaner and clean up all the broken crisps. Ok, so I admit this isn’t strictly a DIY task, but if I don’t “Do It Myself” this time then who the hell will!? At least in the evening i finally get to put my home made BBQ to use after 2 weekends of perpetual bad weather. As I tuck into my burger it suddenly seems like all that hard work in the house and around the garden is worth while after all. 
Once again the weekend is nearly upon us and I can’t wait to get involved in some more home improvement projects. I’m going to spend my lunchtime today searching around a few DIY, gardening and home improvement websites and blogs across the wide world of the internet in order to find some inspiration for my next venture. I’m particularly looking out for some ideas to do with daybed furniture. Keep checking my blog over the weekend for the latest news from my DIY projects. I think the bathroom may need some more work (and certainly a bit of a clean) so I may find myself back on my hands and knees doing some scrubbing!
