funyellow's Profile

Hi there,
my advice: DO NOT GET THE CUISINART WITH THE THERMAL CARAFE.

There is absolutely no way to clean the carafe reliably (trust me I have tried many types of brushes). You can only access the inside of the carafe from a small opening in the top. No matter what method you try to clean the inside, it still holds onto odors and tastes.

You need to be able to scrub the inside of it occasionally and it's designed so that you can't do that. I ended up tossing it :(

wow, how was the siding on that shed/outbuilding done? I love the mix of colors.

i'd like to know how that hood vent works when there's a bedroom above it. does it just recirculate rather than vent somewhere?

When we moved into our first home, our friends arrived with one of those large rubbermaid "buckets" that has rope handles (the kind of multipurpose bucket that you could put ice and beer in, or fill with dirt, or... put laundry in, or anything). They filled it with LOTS Of small but useful things:

- felt pads for sticking to underside of furniture so the floors won't scratch
- miracle gro sticks for houseplants
- small paintbrushes and paint tray for trimwork
- "goo-gone" for removing sticky stuff from windows or picture frames, etc
- a warm fuzzy fleece blanket
- "green" cleaning products - some sprays, kitchen cleaners, etc
- scrubbers and sponges
- packets of nails in various sizes and thicknesses

stuff like that - at the time we couldn't think about using it all but over the course of the year we used EVERY single thing in that bucket. it was truly the most useful gift ever, and we think about them every time we use something from that bucket!

You might be surprised to hear that my Hampton Bay umbrella from Home Depot (with solar panel that lights up LED's inside at night) has held up two years so far, and we leave it outside from April through October. It is not made of wood, and it has a heavy solid base. It's rectangular, and i believe 8feet wide at its widest point so it covers our patio table (for six) perfectly. I balked at the price originally ($100) but when I look at how much the catalogs are charging, I feel like this was a great value. Heartily recommended!

Yikes! Has no one here seen a split-level house before? I can't believe all the comments that think the house is actually sinking. This style is actually quite common in the suburbs of Boston :)

I think you have a wonderful starting point here. The yard looks bare now, but you'll be so grateful that you don't have to spend 2 months worth of weekends tearing out stuff that was poorly planted - you have a blank slate to work with.

The sunlight that will come through those lower level windows is precious and you won't want to block it! You can jazz up the walkway by digging two mulch beds along the sides of the walkway and planting an assortment of annuals and low-lying shrubs (maybe eunonymous, sedum, etc) for color and definition.

Maybe do another mulch bed around the trees so that you don't have to mow around them. Some hanging baskets of colorful annuals on either side of the front door?

You could also add some interest to the front lawn by digging some more planting beds (or maybe a nice large one) in front with some feature plants.