 I know that electricity can be a scary thing. It is a subject that I have avoided for a while because if done wrong it can cause a lot of damage. I have recently put together a full electrical series. But before I talk about this more, if you feel scared of electricity or you have no
That is a good start. I have a more complete electrical series on my web page. If you are a brave soul and are looking to update and repair your electrical in your home, I hope that my series can help you out.
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 Isn't that the truth. Kids are out of school and they are immediately bored. Makes you want to give them a scrub brush and say start cleaning. Even though that wouldn't be a bad thing, well maybe, here is an idea that is a little more fun for you bored kids.
 How it should have ended, or HISHE is a great YouTube channel. They animate alternative endings to popular movies, hence the name "How it should have ended." They also have a great skit with Batman and Superman that reoccur throughout their videos. Their videos are fun and family friendly. That's one reason they are on my YouTube
 Fall is finally here and about to end at the same moment. That seems to happen more then often in the Ozarks. A very short fall and winter is there ready to slap you in the face. And this abrupt change in weather means
need to batten down the hatches. In other words close those crawl space vents and the crawl space opening. Make sure that the cold winter wind isn't whipping through under your home. If you aren't sure what those are check out the slideshow. I have pics of both the vents and the openings.
 I was talking to a good friend of mine and he told me that his wife was nagging him to get a project done. He told me that he wanted to do it, but was a little hesitant because even though he was good around the house he had never laid tile before. He also told me that I didn't have any videos on tile. I thought for a second, and was like, you're right, I don't. It is a little bit of a lengthy project, but last weekend I went through and made a start to finish tile series. I made six videos that go through the project from start to finish. Let me tell you one more thing. I have had friends tell me that they went to the big box stores looking for tile and they were told that even a monkey could lay tile. Well, I find that extremely insulting because laying tile is an art form. Not something that can be done by a mammal who's favorite thing to do is to fling poo! It is though, something that can be accomplished by a DIY'er. Here is the first video in my tile series. I have links to all the videos in the series in the video description or you can follow this link to my website page with all my tile videos.
 It is the second week of November and that means it is time to start thinking about Christmas decorations. You will start off with the highest hopes to create a beautifully lit home.  So the question that I have for you is, how good is your ladder? Is your ladder solid and capable of this task, or are you going to be falling off of your ladder at any moment?  Or maybe you don't have a ladder yet. Maybe this is your first year to decorate your home. So the question comes down to which ladder do you pick? Let me start by saying don't go cheap on your ladder. Falling off never goes well.
ever been on. So, no matter what ladder you choose, use it safely. Pay attention to the grade and type of landscaping it is on. Use a spotter when necessary and don't go cheap on your ladder because any money that you think you might save, will be lost on that trip to the ER.  This post will be a little shorter then my other recent ones, but that doesn't mean that it will be less important. Staining your deck is a very important thing to do . Not only does it make your deck look better, but it protects it from the elements. Now, I am talking about wood decks, not composite. Composite decks don't need to be stained, but they do have their own problems. I won't get into that here. Back to your wood deck. Most decks in the United States are made from treated lumber. Most of the time it is pine, some might include some fir species. A couple of quick notes about treated lumber. First it doesn't last for ever, far from that. Many people that I talk to about it believe that it won't rot because it has been treated. And that couldn't be further from the truth. All wood rots, eventually no matter what. Treated lumber just gives the wood a year or two without rot, then it slowly becomes just like the untreated lumber. So your deck absolutely has to be stained or treated so it doesn't rot off of your home. The second note is if your deck is new, you can't treat it or stain it for a year after it was built. The chemicals that are used in treating the wood will kick out any stain or sealer that you use. I know some of you will say that you stained your deck a month after it was built and it looks fine. Ok sure, but the stain won't have half of it's life expectancy and will have to be re-stained much sooner. Below is a video that I made talking about different types of stains and different application methods. It's one of my older videos, but still very relevant. And if you are experiencing a very warm fall still, like I am, there is still time to protect your deck before winter hits.
 All of us have seen the lint that comes off the dryer screen. Well I assume that you have. This simple build up of the fibers off of your clothes has to be constantly removed so that your dryer can work. Actually, dryer manufacturers suggest that you do this after every load. We all know that doesn't happen, at least not all the time. And in some cases I have seen people who did the entire family's weekly laundry without clearing it and while pulling out the screen some of that lint falls back into the dryer. Even if you clean your screen out every time, there is lint that makes it past the screen. So where does this rogue lint go? Most of the time it just attaches itself to the walls of your dryer vent line that runs out of your home. I want to take a second and talk about the lint screen a little more, then I will get back to the lint in your vent pipe, I promise. Sometimes keeping your lint screen free of lint isn't enough, especially if you use dryer sheets. I know a lot of you out there love dryer sheets, but they cause a build up in your dryer. This buildup is near invisible, but can cause a lint screen to block up and not let air through. The way that you can test this is to take your lint screen to the kitchen sink and run some water on the screen. Holding the lint screen flat, does it hold water? Yes, I am asking if screen can hold water. If you have a build up from the dryer sheets your lint screen can hold water like a bowl. Obviously this is bad, but don't worry because it is easily fixed. Just use a little dish detergent and wash the screen. Then shake off the excess water and return to your dryer. If you had a problem then doing this on a regular basis will be required to help make sure that your dryer is working to it's full potential. If this is not taken care of it can cause your dryer to burn out and create expensive repairs. OK, now back to the dryer vent like I promised. This is something else in your home that needs to be maintained. I know that a lot of you are thinking that no one ever told you that. Well I am telling you that now. This buildup can damage your dryer and will add to the possibility of a lint fire. You can buy dryer vent cleaning kits and take care of this yourself, or you can hire a local handyman to do it. I just did my personal home last weekend and realized that it should have been done a while back. It's hard to say how often you should have this done. It boils down to how much laundry that you do, how well you keep the lint screen cleaned, ect. I also found out that because my neighbor is a hairdresser that the loose hair stuck to their clothes doubled this issue. So having your vents cleaned every 5 years is probably an ok number, plus or minus depending on your own laundry habits. Here is a video of me cleaning out my vent pipes. Take a moment and watch so that you can see how much lint really is in there.
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