One of the reasons I love writing HomeStars’ Friday post, The Tool Box, is because it gives me the chance to research and see what’s hot in homes, renovations, and décor. And some of the things you find regarding homes written by other bloggers and media is quite interesting. Take a look at what I found this week.
The Importance of Home Staging
Selling your home can be an extremely difficult and emotional decision. It’s a good thing we have professionals like realtors, handyman and inspectors to help us through the process. One profession that’s growing is Home Stagers. A recent post by Hooked on Houses shows some bad MLS photos and why you should probably remove animals from the house.
Fun & Functional
The first priority of a home appliance is that it’s functional. This is the main reason why when it doesn’t work it’s either repaired or replaced.
Northstar refrigerators can now be purchased with a factory-installed Brew Master draft system.
I can see this being a big seller and a new addition to a number of basement-to-man cave renovations.
Bedroom Furniture: The Headboard
High on my personal list of things to do is adding a headboard to my bed. It’s been on the list for a long time but since my bedroom is a hodge-podge of chest of drawers and chairs, I’ve never given much thought to actually doing it myself.
In my home décor theory, hodge-podge rooms require some DIY creations.
I found some beautiful upholstered headboards on Centsational Girl which gave me some food-for-thought for what I may want. I think I may be ready to tackle the project after watching the DIY fabric-wrapped headboard video on Canadian House & Home. Wish me luck!
Uses for Everyday Items
I can always trust Real Simple to provide me with some easy tools and ideas to remember and easily implement at home. Four of the 28 uses for everyday items are all about salt. They are:
~Clean up a cracked egg: Cover the mess with a handful of salt, then wipe up with ease.
~Dust a wreath. Place a wreath of pinecones or faux evergreen in a paper bag with a 1/4 cup of salt. Fold the top of the bag over and gently shake.
~Remove tea stains. Sprinkle salt on a lemon peel, then rub it on a tea-stained cup.
~Shine brass and copper. Make a paste of a few tablespoons of white vinegar with equal parts salt and flour. Apply with a soft cloth, rinse and dry.
You can find the rest list at 28 Uses for Everyday Items.
Sunflowers
As the summer starts to wind down, know we still have sunflowers and they are working overtime in Japan.
Sunflowers, millions of them, have been planted in Japan to help soak up toxins from the ground. After the devastating tsunami in March, the flowers were planted and seeds are being given out all over Fukushima to help combat as much radioactive fallout as possible.
Not just functional but fun.
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The Tool Box is a weekly blogging segment that reviews the past week’s trends in the home improvement industry or hot topics for the home. If you come across a cool post or video you think should be included, share it with us by sending an email with the subject line “Tool Box” to inbound AT homestars DOT com, or Tweet it to @HomeStars.
