“I just wanted to let my readers know that that I just received this email from HGTV.  Looks like an interesting opportunity for some handy person.”

HGTV is seeking charismatic, energetic, non-professional handy men and women to participate in the upcoming competition series All American Handyman. 

Strong carpentry skills, experience with tools, creativity and excellent problem-solving skills are key. Winner to be awarded significant prize package. 

Please visit http://www.HGTV.com/handyman  to enter.

Have you ever been frustrated by your shower curtain? They tend to get moldy fast, they rip, they tangle and they allow just too much water to end up on the floor.  Well, if so don’t be concerned, you can always install shower doors or a shower enclosure which is exactly what we did yesterday for a customer here on Long Island.

If you are considering tossing that old shower curtain for a new shower enclosure, you had better do your homework.  Doors quality ranges widely and prices range from a couple of hundred bucks in Home Depot or Lowes and go well into the thousands in some of your finer stores throughout Long Island.  And I recommend getting the best doors that your budget will allow because just like everything else you get what you pay for.

But it will be worth it because along with everything else shower doors make the bathroom so much more pleasing to the eye and even add to the resale value of your home.

That is unless they get dirty.  There is nothing uglier than soap scum or hard water deposit build up on glass shower doors.  And to make matters worse it’s really difficult to remove once it happens.

I have had more than a couple of customers purchase new doors only because the old ones became too dirty to clean. If you have ever tried to clean the glass in your shower, I’m sure that you learned just how difficult it was to get it clean.

Are you having a problem keeping your glass shower doors or tub enclosure from getting that ugly soap scum and hard water build up?

Well first, you want to prevent the buildup from occurring in the first place.  So here is what you do,

• Use a squeegee to clean the glass after every shower to remove any possible buildup before it has a chance to accumulate.
• You can also use a daily after shower spray cleaner.  Simply spray the cleaner on the tile and glass after the last shower is taken.  This will help prevent buildup as well.

But what do you do if your glass has already begun to look somewhat cloudy,

• By simply wetting a Mr. Clean Magic Eraser and working it around on the glass you should be able to remove most of the buildup.
• If you don’t have a Magic Eraser, a sponge with a semi-abrasive side and a variety of household cleaners works well.  Begin with the mildest ones such as vinegar.  If that doesn’t work try a glass cleaner such as Windex and if you still need something stronger, CLR works well.

And to completely protect your shower doors or enclosure and make sure that soap scum and hard water don’t adhere apply Rain-X directly to the glass.  Although it was originally meant for your car’s windshield, it does the job on your shower glass as well causing all water and build up to run right off.

There is nothing like a glass shower enclosure to add elegance and ease of maintenance to your bathroom, that is unless your glass accumulates soap scum and hard water deposits. Daily maintenance, periodic cleaning and sealing the glass will keep your shower doors or shower enclosure looking the way that it was meant to for many years to come.

Posts like this are written several times per week by Your Long Island Handyman.  Subscribe to our RSS feed below to find out when the next one is published.

Bifold doors can be installed easily and quickly and are an excellent choice wherever space is limited and .  Here is a Bob Villa “Get Better Results” video that goes through all the steps of basic bifold door installation.  Enjoy!

Additional questions can be addressed to onlinehandyman@gmail.com 

Image by evelynishere via Flickr

We all know how unsightly clutter is.  We also know how our homes seem so much more spacious and how we feel better about them when we are free of it.  And clutter is a big problem that affects many people.

Recently one of my readers wrote to me to too tell me about not only their clutter problem, but how they solved it.  My reader whom I’ll call Laura and her family had a very disorganized, cluttered home.  No matter how hard they tried the family just could not seem to become clutter free.

There were always dirty dishes piling up in the sink, magazines, newspapers and mail seemed to always collect on whatever counter tops were available.   Pens, papers, books, CD’s and all kinds of junk just always seemed to be constantly accumulating.

Recently things were getting so bad that Laura was beginning to think that she was going to need to rent storage in a local storage facility.  That is until she realized just how much it was going to cost.

In fact, that’s all that it took to motivate Laura to go on a campaign to get rid of clutter.  I guess you could say that Laura finally had enough!

Have you ever felt like you were getting to your breaking point when it came to the clutter in your home, but just couldn’t get yourself to take action?

If so, besides realizing that it can hit you right in the wallet, here are a couple of other organizing tips to get you moving towards an uncluttered home.

1. Establish realistic goals – Don’t overwhelm yourself by attempting to unclutter to big of an area at one time.  Do as much as you think that you can accomplish – and don’t forget to give yourself credit for your accomplishment, no matter how small you think that it is.

2. Music - Cleaning and organizing doesn’t have that unpleasant of a chore.  Make the job fun!

3. Get help - Enlist the help of other family members.  It may mean that you will have to offer something back in return, but it will also lead to good quality time and a project that everyone can be proud of.

4. Make money - See what unused stuff you could sell at a garage sale or on ebay.  At the very least take a moment to realize, like my reader Laura how much money you will be saving when you get rid of clutter.

Clutter and being disorganized is a big problem that affects many people.  Unfortunately many people also think that fixing their clutter problem is a very unpleasant experience when really it is just a matter of how you look at it.

What motivtes you to get rid of the clutter in your home, we would love to hear it!

Articles like these are published several times per week.  You can click on my feed right below to be notified whenever something new comes out.

Here is a video that I found of a guy using two products that I recommended in a previous post and really like when it comes to cleaning grout – baking soda for moderate soiling and Oxyclean for heavier build ups.  I only wish that he had focused more on the results. 

Image by mclii via Flickr

Chair rails, some people love them, some people don’t.  Personally I think that they add a lot of appeal to a room, by giving it character.  However, I have heard people say that they make a wall look cluttered and too broken up.  But, I am going to leave that to a different day.  Today I want to talk about installing them.

I got the idea for this post by visiting a friend of mine over the holidays.  Larry recently had moved into a new home and even though he didn’t have experience in home repairs, he has done most of the work himself.  And there has been quite a bit to do because although the house that he bought had a lot of good features, it was kind of plain and had been neglected.

With the state of the economy and the fact that Larry’s company has been freezing salaries, it was the best house that they could afford.  But, Larry has a couple of kids and the apartment that they had been living in was just becoming too small.

Considering that this was the first time that Larry had done this kind of work, the home was really shaping up well, but when it came to chair rails and moldings in general he had some reservations.

Larry explained to me that he was apprehensive about cutting the wood, measuring and making the joints fit together right.  I told him that it really wasn’t that difficult and I thought that he was capable of handling it.  So I was very glad to see that he had the work completed when I stopped by over the holidays.

Do the rooms in your house need some sprucing up, but you have some reservations when it comes to installing moldings such as chair rails the way Larry did?Well, you need not be! It’s easy – here is what you need to do.

1. Measure – Measure the linear footage of the area where your chair rail is to be installed.  Make sure to add a minimum of 10% especially if you have never done this kind of work before.

2. Purchase materials – Materials can be purchased at any lumber yard and most home improvement stores. Purchase materials in lengths that you can easily get home, but will require you to make as few joints as possible.

3. Layout sections – Determine where the various sections of your new chair rails will be installed. Then number the backs of the individual pieces and make a corresponding chart on a piece of paper so later you know where each piece is meant to go.

4. Miter corners – You will need a miter box and small fine tooth saw.  Your cuts will be on 45 degree angles that should point into or out from the corners.   Outside corners are made by holding a section of chair rail in place, past an outside corner and drawing a vertical line on the back of it even with the end of the wall which is used as the short side of the 45 degree cut.

(This is your trickiest part of installing moldings.  First, if your walls are anything but a right 90 degree angle, I recommend leaving this job to a pro because your miter box is only capable of straight and 45degree cuts.  But, assuming your walls do meet at 90 degrees always make your first cut leaving several extra inches at the other end of your section of wood.  The reason for this is because many times especially in older homes the walls do not meet at exactly right angles and you will need to do some adjusting.  Only once you make your first 45 degree cut, will you be able to tell how well the pieces are going to fit together.  Often you will need to make a second cut just slightly more or less than 45 degrees right behind the first one.)

5. Paint – Paint or stain the sections that you just cut before you attach them to the wall.  This is much easier than having to worry about getting paint on the wall – you can touch up the nail holes later.

6. Line – Create a line on the wall at the height of the top of the chair rail using a level.  A 4′ level works best, but you can use a 2′ level if a 4′ one is not available. The general rule is that the chair rail should be between 32″ and 36″ from the floor or about 1/3 of the way up the wall for an 8′ ceiling.

7. Attach – Attach the chair rails to the wall with their top of side even with the level line that you drew using 2 to 2 1/2 inch finish nails.  Use a nail set so that you don’t damage your new chair rails when hammering.

8. Finish – Fill your nail holes with wood filler, sand flat once they are dry and touch up with paint.

Installing chair rails is like anything else, it takes practice and some patience.  Good luck and remember to have fun.  If you have any questions you can contact me at onlinehandyman@gmail.com

Articles like these are published several times per week.  You can click on my feed below to be notified whenever something new comes out.

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Yesterday, we were hit with one of the worst pre Christmas blizzards in years.  The weather man actually got it right.  For days they had been predicting a massive Nor’easter and we got it!  By the time the sun came up this morning most areas had between 12 and 24 inches of snow.

It’s so frustrating on days when you have to go to work and see snow on the ground.  Today however was not one of those days.  Nope, today was Sunday and there was more time and a lot less of a frantic pace to get the snow cleared.

Besides all I needed to do was clean the cars in the driveway, clear the driveway itself and then the walk to the house.  And considering that I have a 24 inch wide snow blower, I figured that the snow was really going to be no big deal.

But, was I ever wrong because upon attempting to start the snowblower I soon realized that the  carburetor was bad.  I attempted to repair it, but without any luck and Home Depot didn’t have a replacement.

I was able to clean off the cars but considering that there was in excess of 20 inches of snow on the ground and the driveway and walk needed to be cleared there was nothing left to do but pull out a good old fashioned snow shovel.

As I said, normally the snowblower makes this kind of work easy, but digging out with a snow shovel is a completely different story.  However considering that there was no alternative, there I was shoveling over 20 inches of snow.

Surprisingly enough I cleared the snow, and although it did take a while I must have been up to the task because I didn’t feel tired and had no sore muscles or joints – a cup of hot coffee and I was on my way to do more holiday shopping.

Would you like to be able to shovel snow and not have it take a physical toll on your body?  Well, you can, but there are a couple of things that you are going to need to do.

1. Keep track of the snowfall – If a lot of snow is expected it’s best to shovel a couple of inches every few hours.

2. Dress warmly and in layers – shoveling snow is hard work.  In fact, it a form of exercise and by dressing in layers, as your body heats up, you will be able to remove your outside layers of clothing and still keep warm.

3. Pace yourself – If you’re not in shape or have not done physical work in a while, make sure that you don’t do too much at a time.  Divide the areas that you need to shovel into smaller areas and do one at a time.

4. Don’t lift too much and don’t bend with your back – Don’t put the stress on your back and if the snow is wet remember to only take small bites at a time.

Shoveling snow is hard work!  It can really take a toll on your body especially if you are out of shape or have not exerted yourself in a while.  Take care and shovel wisely you will be very glad that you did.

Articles like this are posted here 2 to 3 times per week.  If you enjoyed what you just read you can subscribe to our RSS feed in the far right column.

Let’s face it, home repairs aren’t cheap.  Not to say that your contractor is ripping you off, but time is money and when you are paying for someone’s time it can get rather costly.  After all they, have to earn a living too.

As you may have noticed, I have not been blogging in the last week as much as I would like.  Why?  Because I have been busy off-line on-the-job fixings almost everything especially in one particular home.  As soon as I repair one thing, the homeowner appears with a list of several more things that need my attention.

For me it has been a really good job with a lot of work, for the homeowner it is going to be somewhat different.  Although it is going to seem like a different house, I am going to have to present to this homeowner quite a sizable invoice.  After all, I spent so much time away from the things that I really like to do.  There was rotting wood, broken tiles, doors that didn’t close and painting that needed to be done.  
 
Considering that this has been a difficult year at best economically, I’m glad to have a job like this.  And I’m also sure that the homeowner will be glad to get all of this work behind him, except as I mentioned he probably will not be that excited when he gets my bill. 

Would you like to avoid excessive home repairs and the bills that go along with them? Would you like to save money?  Well, you can, it’s really not that difficult, it just takes some planning and a few good habits.

1.  DIY – do as much of the work as you can yourself.  Even if your contractor isn’t billing by the hour, you can be assured that he is still billing by the amount of work to that has to be done.
 
2. Combine several jobs – not only is there a minimum charge,each time a contractor has to come into your home, two jobs done at the same time can be done faster by sharing materials and manpower and thus save you money than if each job is done separately.

3. Maintenance – maintaining your home either by doing it yourself or hiring a professional contractor will help you save money and avoid a situation like the one that my customer is in which is needing everything done at the same time.

4. Be flexible – ask your contractor if he or she has a time in their schedule that they haven’t been able to, but would like to fill.  Often by helping them out and taking a time that they slot that they choose, they will save you a couple of bucks.

Home repairs can be rather expensive, but by applying a few simple techniques they don’t have to be as high as you think.  And if you really want to save money on your home maintenance and repairs, fill in your name and email address in the box on the far right.  By doing so you will receive periodic strategies and ideas that will keep you’re hard earned money in your pocket and not your contractors.      

Crown molding can be used to add style to any room.  The question is however, what kind of crown molding to use – size and shape can vary greatly.  This video will give you a few basic guidlines to make the right choice.