Label it vintage and call your parents! They’ll be proud that you’ve hung old family photos in your home whether it’s artsy or just fun.  From amusing by kimberly,

After painting my room, I immediately wanted to spray paint all of my picture frames white and hang them back up. However, a sad impediment arose when I discovered we only had one barely-filled can of spray paint. Therefore, I was only able to spray one frame when the whistling sound of air began emitting from the can and no paint followed.

Her photo collage project will be quite nice when done. Showing two photos…

This

to this…

Nice job, Kimberly!

As cooler temperatures begin making their way across the country (with the possible exception of the always-hot Texas), it’s time to take a good long ook on how to boost your home’s energy efficiency.  Zillow.com offers five quick tips, but I believe two are the most helpful,

• Install a thermostat that you can program yourself.  Cooler temperatures in the winter when you’re away from the house, and warmer when you’re home, for example, can save you a ton of money.
• Regularly change your furnace filters.  This is such an easy step, but incredibly many people forget it. While you’re changing your filters, it also won’t hurt to get your heat/air unit inspected a couple of times a year.

Stay warm!

I don’t know how one would begin construction on a bubble dome, but I suppose it would be good to have in the rain.  As long as no lightning is involved!

From Gordon Whelpley,

Fancy hanging outside in a heavy rain? How about burning man in a bubble dome? Or just chilling on the beach at low tide, whatever you may be doing a bubble would make an awesome addition to your experience.

Check these out!

Ready for a do-it-yourself home project?  You can zombie proof your house!  It may cost a pretty penny – what for the mechanics of pulling down the steel doors, stocking the roof with the proper defense, and (what was left out of this house) a court yard for raising your own food, but if the zombies come it would be well worth the investment!

From our friends at PopFi,

So how safe is this house?  Well, for starters, you can seal off the entire first floor from outside entrance using some heavy-looking movable block walls and metal security doors.  The only permanent entrance to the house is on the second floor, and that is protected by a removable drawbridge/gangplank type of thing that folds up perfectly into the profile of the house for maximum protection.

Here’s the before:

Zombie after:

Thanks, guys!

I watch too many home improvement shows. Which is why, during one, I decided we needed a kitchen makeover. Not a whole new kitchen, I just wanted to give it a little update. Those home improvement shows make it look so easy. So, that is how we ended up in one of those wonderful man stores on a Saturday morning picking out new laminate for the counters.

I was pleasantly surprised to discover that my boyfriend and I had similar tastes in what would soon (ha ha) become our new counter top. Just for grins, I suggested we paint the kitchen while we were at it. When we bought the house it was a hideous blue that we quickly painted a cheerful minty green. That was six years ago, let’s freshen it up I thought. So, we picked out paint. My boyfriend got the crazy idea to paint the cabinets too, since they are just cheap cabinets with no personality.

When I asked him how long it would take, he valiantly agreed to take a week off from work. With my help he assured me it should be done by the end of that week. No problem! In a week’s time I should have a beautiful new kitchen with taupe cabinets, cream colored walls and new high definition laminate counters that almost look like granite. I pictured it and it was lovely!

Well, that was a month and a half ago. About two- thirds of the kitchen is done, meaning two thirds of the walls are painted, and two-thirds of the counters are complete. The cabinets are at about the halfway mark. I am ready for this to be done. So, that is the plan for this weekend, get it finished. I need a fully workable kitchen again (did I mention that a crazy amount of my kitchen stuff is sitting all over my office/craft room?)

So, now I am trying to determine what the next home improvement will be. I have a feeling it will be to stop watching home improvement shows!

Guest Author Theresa Hesse is full time mom of two rambunctious children, full time employee, part time student and devoted to her family and friends.  Being a tiny bit insane helps juggle everything!! Theresa enjoys writing, sewing and music.  Her dislikes include sorting socks, yardwork and scratchy blankets.

A friend of mine has a log cabin next to a bubbling stream.  If this isn’t idyllic enough, the inside has a long, warm kitchen with a long, warm table in which you could spend hours talking, laughing, and reminiscing.

The kitchen table is central in the comfort of a home.  It can be elegant or whimsical.  It can be plastic, metallic, or wood.  And it can be changed if you’re not feeling the love.

While the table featured at Ikea Hackers is a coffee table, you can gain inspiration for an interesting kitchen table right here.

The finish on this coffee table had a way of collecting and showing off dust, fingerprints, and crumbs like you wouldn’t believe. It was driving me nuts so I decided to decoupage the top to add color, texture, and dimension to an otherwise boring table.

I would suggest book covers, newspapers with significant headlines or photos, or magazine covers as a possible table cover. Click through to read the directions on applying the new table top and good luck!

Having the right tools can make any difficult job a thousand times easier.  In the kitchen, having a specialized tool to carve a watermelon basket can shave a ton of time off the project.  Similarly having a good saw or floor shaver can aid immensely when a homeowner tackles a remodeling job.

But how do you choose tools to use and how do you use them?  Danny Lipford of Today’s Homeowner offers a post on what tools are right for different jobs.

Even professionals need to know when to dig in and invest in power tools.  The Builders Builder says,

There’s a time when renting equipment is chopping up profit and manual labor is too slow. A concrete company must know when to purchase a bobcat. Painters must eventually invest in a sprayer. I’ve seen many that look at tools as being too expensive yet when you have the proper tools for the job, everything is so much easier.

Make the investment if you believe you need the equipment at least several times a year.  Consider what your expenses are over time and what your potential revenue is by completing more jobs because of working more efficiently.

Photo by Mark Hunter via Flickr Creative Commons.

If I could rate the need of rooms to remodel, it would be the kitchen, bathrooms, and then the living room.  In my kitchen I want new counters (give me granite, please), new flooring, and a new design for my pantry.  I want roll out shelves rather than lazy-susan-type shelving.

For my bathroom, I would get rid of my jetted tub that has only been used twice and install a big, luxurious shower.  I’d also re-tile and seal with a grout that doesn’t show when it gets dirty!  For the living room, I’d be happy with hardwood flooring, new paint, and figure out how to lower my fireplace mantle which is about nine inches too high.

Catherine of A Dog and Her Girl is getting to remodel her kitchen.  Here are some of her reasons why,

The laminate floor is peeling up at the seams.

The appliances are old, some of them likely originals from 1957.

The lights over the stove and sink shorted out.

The fan over the stove shorted out as well.

Sometimes the main kitchen light (flourescent) doesn’t turn on and it flickers when it does.

Lucky girl!

Photo from High Tech Consulting.

It’s been a few years since I’ve climbed under my house.  Okay by climb I mean “looked under it with a flash light” but still.  We do have a vapor barrier, but should double check to make sure it’s still in place.  If you need to install one, it can be done fairly drama free.  Here’s how.

Good luck!

My bathtub is still sitting upstairs in its uncaulked glory.  My husband lost his momentum about two years ago to fix it.  Like my loving spouse, rudimentarian has also delayed starting on his kitchen project … a 10 year delay.

Yes, over a decade after I removed the doors, the cabinets were still hanging up, and the same flickering lights were still in place overhead. Lacking confidence in my ability to make a more meaningful repair without screwing something up, I’d grown accustomed to looking at the doorless cabinets and lost all my will to fix them.

From this, I learned that home improvements have a kind of momentum: fixing something leads to other ideas, and builds the confidence to try new things.

I’m not sure if a lack of confidence is to blame for my own bathtub.  I think it’s more of a case of husband having too many other projects going on right now.  Will keep you posted!