How To Get Your Kitchen Ready For The Fall
This is a guest post by Andrew from Kitchen Cabinet Kings
The season is changing again! It’s time to start thinking of a new fresh feel for the fall season. What’s the most fun holiday of the fall? Halloween of course!
Dust off the kitchen cabinets and appliances. It’s time to change over from the warm summer-y feel to the ever-changing colors of the fall. The fall has the best colors so why not incorporate some of that great fall color into the most important room in the house?
Take A Drive
One great idea is to simply drive around the neighborhood and take notice of the beautiful colors of the fall leaves. These colors can serve as wonderful inspiration to change the look of your kitchen. Don’t be scared to use some of the more vibrant colors, you will probably change it again come spring anyway!
Black & Orange
The best way to give your kitchen the Halloween feel is to use black and orange. This isn’t as difficult as it seems. You don’t have to take a brush and start painting all of your kitchen cabinets black. Go out and buy some oranges and put them in a bowl with some dark colored fruit. You still have to go pumpkin picking so don’t forget to pick out a few small pumpkins for your countertops and kitchen tables.
Trick Or Treat
A really creative idea is to buy a decorative vase or glass pitcher and fill it with candy corn. Who doesn’t like candy corn? Even if it isn’t your candy of choice it makes for a really colorful and fun decoration in your kitchen. If you want to get a little more involved go out and buy some orange curtains or drapes and place those on the kitchen windows and you have an instant Halloween look.
All in all it isn’t very difficult to make your kitchen an instant fall classic. Many people simply leave it the way it is because they think it will be too expensive to change the feel of their kitchen. You don’t have to replace kitchen cabinets and add an island to make your kitchen feel different. Take a few of these steps and apply them to your kitchen and pretty soon everyone will be talking about your amazing design skills.
Andrew is the COO and co-founder of Kitchen Cabinet Kings, a leading distributor of discount kitchen and bathroom cabinetry on the Internet. Check Kitchen Cabinet Kings for the lowest prices on kitchen cabinets and bathroom cabinets shipped to you, at wholesale pricing.
Repairing Different Kinds of Outdoor Furniture
There are many kinds of outdoor furniture. Because they are used all the time and subjected to many different kinds of elements, they may be damaged over time. Looking for a professional to repair your damaged furniture may be quite expensive. Fortunately, you can actually repair outdoor furniture by yourself. This article talks about how to repair wicker furniture, rattan furniture, cane furniture, and outdoor chairs. Repairing these pieces of furniture is an excellent project especially for people who like do-it-yourself furniture refinishing work.
Repairing Wicker Furniture
Although wicker furniture is very durable, it may still be damaged and need repairs over time especially when used frequently. You can repair wicker furniture quite easily especially if the damage is only a minor one. The first thing you need to do is to wet and shape the damaged area then let dry. Because of its resilient property, wicker stays in the form you leave it in. If there are any areas with cracks, soak them in linseed oil for a day and keep reapplying until the wicker doesn’t absorb the oil anymore. If roughness is caused by loose spots, use sandpaper to sand it and then spray some lacquer in order to smoothen it. Let the lacquer dry for at least 15 minutes. If strands need to be replaced, you can repair wicker furniture by weaving new strands into it and glue the ends of the strands on areas that are not very noticeable. After you repair outdoor furniture like wicker, make sure to clean it with soapy water at least once a month so that it will last longer.
Repairing Rattan Furniture
To repair outdoor furniture made of rattan, the first thing you need to do is to check the tightness of the joints of the furniture’s frame. Use a dowel rod or a glue injection to re-glue loose joints. While the glue is drying up, hold the joints in place by using a clamp or by tying a rope around it. In larger rattan pieces, the loose joints can be repaired by using screws. To do this, drill a hole smaller than the screw, fill it up with glue, and put in the screw. Make sure not to over tighten it as this may ruin your furniture. Just like when you repair wicker furniture, new rattan strands can be weaved into the furniture to replace damaged ones. If there are areas where material has been chipped off, scrape them with a putty knife and then sand the entire furniture. This will ensure a smooth surface when you decide to paint and finish it. To repair outdoor furniture that is fading or has small dents and cracks, simply paint the entire furniture and then apply a finish after. You can also repair dents and cracks on rattan by using boiled linseed oil. This will not only fill the cracks up but also increase the life of your furniture.
Repairing Cane Furniture
Repairing cane furniture is easy especially if the furniture we are talking about is a chair and it was machine-woven. It is not at all like how to repair wicker furniture. In cane furniture, the canes are attached by spline, a material that can easily be removed or replaced. The most common problem that can occur is sagging. To repair this, simply use a damp cloth to wipe the cane but avoid wetting the frame. This will cause the material to shrink and tighten as it dries, thus, repairing the sag. Let it dry for at least a day. Monthly misting should be done in order to avoid sagging, cracking, and breakage. To repair outdoor furniture that is made of hand-woven cane, it is better to bring them to professionals. This is because hand weaving is an art and only a professional can uphold the beauty of the piece.
Repairing Outdoor Chairs
How to repair outdoor chairs depends upon what material it is made of. Patio chairs are usually built to survive in different weather conditions. However, just like any other piece of furniture, they may deteriorate over time. If your chairs are made of wicker, you can apply the steps on how to repair wicker furniture in fixing them. If your chair is made of vinyl and the straps have become brittle, you can simply replace the straps to make them look new again. To repair outdoor furniture of this kind, the first thing you need to do is cut the old straps out of the chair’s frame then use a rag and detergent to clean the frame. Wrap a tape measure around the frame the way the strap is supposed to wrap it in order to get the measurement. Multiply this by .85 then add an inch to get the measurement of how long you need to cut the new straps. The new measurement is shorter because vinyl straps tend to expand with heat. Drill holes near the straps’ ends and cut the ends 45 degrees so that it can easily be inserted into the frame. Soak the new straps in boiling water for 5 minutes and then attach its ends to plastic rivets. Finally, wrap the frame with the new straps. If the chair is wooden you may want to try refinishing it too.
When our furniture experiences wear and tear, it is easy for us to go looking for a professional right away. However, it is actually fairly easy to repair wicker furniture and other types of outdoor furniture. Instead of looking for a professional to repair outdoor furniture for you, you can actually do it yourself. However, if you choose to do this, you should make sure that you protect yourself by using safety glasses, gloves, and face masks.
Bringing Nature Home | Bunk beds
You have spent countless hours perfecting your soil chemistry, you have carefully orchestrated the sunlight distribution to make sure that each plant in your garden gets exactly what it needs and you are very proud of your hard work. It’s time to let the garden expand into your home and lend its beauty to your living space.
Bringing a little nature into your home can be very simple or complicated. It really depends on to what extreme you want to take this project. The simplest way to do this is to stick to natural materials in your furniture choices. Get some wicker chairs for the living room and some hardwood bunk beds for the kid’s room. Decorate in natural colors like greens and browns with splashes of bright colors here and there.
Once you have bought those bunk beds and redesigned your home to have a more natural feel, you can start to think about bringing actual plants into your house. If you were to suddenly bring potted plants into your living room that is decorated in all pink and white they are going to stand out and look pretty awful actually. Get plants that produce fruit or flowers so that they can be the splash of color that you add to your home. Chili peppers are a great option because they come in a variety of beautiful colors and varieties, but they are still edible and useful.
Make sure that you place your new indoor friends someplace that gets a good amount of light. You don’t want to stick them behind those bunk beds where they won’t see any sun. On the other hand, you could get sunlight replicating lights and carefully time the amount of light they get each day.
One last consideration for those of us with children or pets, make sure that all of the plants you bring into your home are pet and child safe.
Sponsors
 |
 |