For those of us “blessed” to own an old home, it’s common knowledge that one measure of “character” is the lack of a single plumb, level or square surface in the entire house. A second indicator of character is the complete absence of identical windows. [click to continue…]
Hardware
There’s a six-lane road north of where I live, outside of Pittsburgh, aptly nicknamed McNightmare Road by the locals. Its real name is McKnight Road, and with its abundance of malls, restaurants, car dealers, and the like, it’s the place to go if you love shopping, eating, or sitting in snarled traffic. Since eating is the only aforementioned activity I enjoy, I routinely avoid the area like the Pittsburgh Pirates avoid playing in the post-season. I only venture into the fray when there’s something there I can’t get elsewhere. [click to continue…]
Tool and accessory organization has been around for years, with Festool in particular being well known for their Systainer and Sortainer products. In fact, if you looked into a high quality modular storage, organization and transport solution (here in the States), Festool was pretty much the only game in town. But watch your back Festool, Bosch (and Sortimo) are gunning for you with their new line of Click & Go L-Boxx models. Although you can get the L-Boxx in sizes big enough to store your worm drive circ saw, we recently checked out the smallest in the series, the L-Boxx-1A for fastener and accessory storage. Bosch sent us a few L-Boxx-1A’s to test out, and, they’re also providing a killer LBoxx prize package to one lucky winner of our December 2012 HomeFixated Free Stuff Giveaway. Win it, and even Santa will covet your newfound organization. [click to continue…]
When I was a kid, I slept in a Murphy bed. They’re also known as hideaway beds or wall beds. It was awesome for several reasons, but one in particular: making my bed consisted of bungee-cording my pillow and blanket to the bed and then sending it up and into the wall. It took me about 3 seconds to “make” my bed, with no military style sheet tucking or parental nagging needed. To this day I am still reluctant to make the bed. After all, I’m only going to be sleeping in it again later that same day. It’s wasted effort I say! Not surprisingly, my wife disagrees with this philosophy. If you’d like to avoid making your bed and then hide the evidence of your misconduct, maybe a Murphy Bed is just what you need too. But wait, I know what you’re thinking, “Aren’t Murphy Beds around $2000?!” Not if you DIY your own Murphy Bed with the Create-a-Bed kit available from our sponsor Rockler. [click to continue…]
I’m sure there are a ton of people out there who have wood sash windows. Either you’re like me and they are the original wood windows from 1935 and have 37 layers of paint, including that awful lime green from the ’60s, or you’re lucky enough/not so cheap as me and have nice wood windows that are insulated and free of lead paint. Either way, I’m sure that at some point you have experienced issues with the inner sash swelling and getting hung up on the stop bead. [click to continue…]
