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Home Remodeling

Maintenance Tips for Your Outdoor Chimney and Fire Pit

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What could be better than spending warm summer nights with your family around a fire? Adding a fire feature will take your backyard to the next level. From grand fireplaces to modest firepits, your loved ones will have a blast roasting marshmallows and making memories.

However, fire features do require a certain amount of TLC. Caring for these structures increases their lifespan and helps keep everyone safe. Use these maintenance tips for your outdoor chimney and fire pit to create the perfect backyard.

Keep Everything Clean

First things first—keeping your fire features clean is essential to their overall maintenance. Fireplaces and pits generate ash as they burn materials, and this debris can get everywhere and clog up important ventilation components.

Clear out any ash or remaining firewood. For brick pits, you’ll need to use a stiff-bristled brush to scrub away any tough stains. You can use a soft, damp cloth to wipe away messes on metal pits, but be careful when using water; make sure to dry your metal structure thoroughly to avoid rust.

Avoid Drastic Temperature Changes

Fire features produce a lot of heat, a fact which surprises absolutely no one. However, what does surprise some homeowners is that drastic temperature changes can damage your structures.

Going from hot to cold too quickly can cause your chimney and pit materials to crack—this usually happens when you use cold water to clean a freshly-used fire feature. Cracks are safety hazards, so make sure to give your structure plenty of time to cool off before performing any maintenance.

Choose Fuel Carefully

There are several options when it comes to fuel for your fire feature. However, you need to choose carefully, especially if you have children nearby. Burning trash, fire accelerants, or low-quality lumber can be dangerous and emit potentially harmful fumes.

If you assemble them correctly, gas stoves are safe and easy to use. You can also burn high-quality wood for a clean and warm fire. Additionally, outdoor fireplaces need chimneys to direct smoke away from your yard, so using the right materials will improve your air quality.

Hire a Chimney Sweep

The final maintenance tip for outdoor chimneys and fire pits involves hiring a professional. Chimney sweeps know exactly what to look for and have the best resources to clean your fire feature. Even if you can do most of these things yourself, having an expert inspect for safety hazards doesn’t hurt.

Once you’ve cleaned, checked for cracks, picked the right fuel, and hired a chimney sweep, your fire features will be ready to use! Get your family out for some fun around the fire and have a summer they won’t soon forget.

How To Rehab Your Home and Preserve Its Charm

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Undertaking the project of remodeling an older home is a labor of love. You’re bound to find hidden issues and attempt to stick to the budget. You want to protect the cozy charm that comes with owning a home with a history. Let’s explore how to rehab your home and preserve its charm.

Conservative Structural Changes

When you’re working with an older home, it’s common to come across structural issues. These issues could be rotting wood, a leaky roof, or termite damage. Weigh out the pros and cons of gutting the wall versus eliminating it.

Open floor plans are the trend right now, but most homes built in the 1900s don’t offer open floor plans. Some of the charms of older homes come from individual rooms that served a purpose.

Modernize With Caution

The most popular areas of a home to modernize are the kitchen and bathrooms. Before you begin a remodel, take a look and decide what items from these rooms you’d like to preserve. Take a peek at other homes built during the same period to discover the popular style and find historical features you appreciate.

Properly Upgrade Electric and Plumbing

Most older homes will not have updated electrical and plumbing. This issue can be a safety hazard for your family and your home. Hire a professional to ensure all plumbing and electrical wiring are up to code.

Repair Windows and Doors

Windows and doors get a bad rap the older they get because they weren’t properly maintained and let in drafts. You risk losing the home’s historical value if you add new doors and windows to your home. Instead, try weather stripping the windows to make them more effective. If you have to replace the windows, try storm windows that adhere to the home’s era.

Take time to restore the old wooden interior doors and keep those glass handles too.

Keep the Cabinets

Most times, the cabinets only need a bit of love to rejuvenate them. Strip and refinish the wooden cabinets instead of replacing them. You’ll usually find older cabinets created from natural wood instead of the medium-density fiberboard we see today. The older cabinets are going to last longer and help keep the original charm of the home.

Refinish Tubs and Sinks

Typically, homeowners will replace old tubs and sinks with modern ones. This swap is costly and also takes away from the charm of the home. You can refinish a porcelain tub for less than the price of purchasing and installing a new one.

Repair Wood Floors

Another way to rehab your home and preserve its charm is to avoid covering up the original wooden floors. Hire a professional to sand, fix, and restain the majestic floors that were hiding underneath tile or carpet.

Implementing these strategies and adding some contemporary touches that you and the family will enjoy is a great way to create a livable home while retaining its original style. It’s the perfect combination of old-school charm and modern living.

Ways to Survive Home Remodeling With Kids

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As a proactive dad, you’re probably constantly trying to find new and exciting ways to spend time with your family. Well, this is not one of them. However, remodeling your home needn’t be a daunting venture either. It will all come down to how well you plan the entire ordeal, how well you prepare for it, and how well you structure your kids’ time for maximum compliance and minimal property destruction during the whole thing. In fact, you might want to begin by consulting a home remodeling & renovation guide to help with some ideas.

Kids are hard work, okay, let’s not kid around, and no matter how much you would love to send them away along with your darling partner so that you can renovate and remodel on your own terms, the reality is going to be far different. With that in mind, here is your quick-and-easy guide on how to survive home remodeling with your kids.

Dad, what’s remodeling?

Oh, that moment when a kid catches you off guard with a complex question you simply can’t formulate an answer for on the spot. Just be glad it’s this one and not the birds and the bees. However, much like with any complex question, you need to have a simple, kid-friendly answer at the ready in order to avoid any further discussion and keep your kids happy.

This is why it’s a good idea to prepare for this question well in advance, come up with an easy answer, and maybe even sit them down to explain the whole process. Explaining to your kids what’s going to happen in the weeks and months to come will be instrumental in getting them to adjust to the new lifestyle, say bye-bye to the bedroom they once knew, and embrace the new living arrangement.

Make a detailed plan to uphold your routine

Your home might be in complete disarray and missing a wall or two, but that doesn’t mean that your routine should fall through in the process. In fact, one of the best ways to preserve peace in the household and prevent utter confusion on a daily basis is to keep doing what you always did. Not only will this keep your kids calm, but it will present you as the father figure your kids can look up to.

You might end up having breakfast in the garage, but as long as you’re having it at the same time every morning, you’re bound to keep the family train on its tracks. Remember, a modern father takes initiative, he is determined and does best with what he’s got.

Give the kids a part in the project

Another great idea that can help you keep the peace in your house while workers are tearing it down is to give your kids a seemingly important role to play in the entire thing. This should be something menial such as helping you pick out bathroom supplies or pick a new color for their bedroom, something along those lines.

Whatever it is, make sure they feel valued for their contribution – who knows, they might even help you put an amazing finishing touch to a room, so trust your kids and don’t forget to present the whole thing as a fun adventure. This brings us to the next crucial point.

Child-proof the place, or just kick them out

It’s amazing how kids manage to bewilder you with a profound, smart question that makes you feel like you’re raising the next NASA employee of the year, and then the next moment they’re slamming their heads against a wall. Kids are like that, they run around, they make a mess, and oftentimes, they get a bump on their forehead in the process.

If you want to avoid rushing to the emergency room because your kid hit their head on a support beam, you will do well to child-proof the house beforehand. Our friends at Porch also have a handy reference on this topic. If that seems like a chore, then just send them away to their grandparents during the biggest remodel.

Give yourself, and the kids, a break

Last but not least, the key to coexisting peacefully with your kids, and your partner, lies in taking an occasional break, and just getting away from all the hustle and bustle. Don’t worry, the house will still be there when you come back from the restaurant, and truth be told, the workers might not even need you for an entire weekend, so give yourself a break and take a well-deserved mini vacation in a nice kid-friendly spa upstate.

Kids are great, aren’t they, what their constant running, screaming, play-fighting, and unbelievable inability to sit down for a second and listen to your boring explanation of why your house is going to look way different in the near future. Nevertheless, with these essential tips in mind, you should have no problem organizing a smooth remodeling project your entire family can enjoy.