unseasonal advice
How Do You Save on Heating Bills (and Keep Warm)?
11:00AM Gina Trapani | ‘Tis the season for nippy weather and high heating bills. If you’re sick of seeing your cash fly out the window into the cold, Real Simple magazine offers some tips for lowering your bill in the lower temperatures, like turning on the ceiling fan to blow down hot air, turning down the temperature on the water heater, and closing off unused rooms. How do you save a few bucks on the heating bill? Tell us your tricks in the comments. Save on Home Heating This Winter [Real Simple] More »
Recycle Old Skis into a DIY Sled
9:10AM Gina Trapani | If you’ve got an old pair of skis gathering dust in the garage, turn them into a killer sled with an easy mod. The Out Your Backdoor blog explains: What you do is take a plastic tub sled ($10 hardware store) and screw a pair of XC skis to the bottom of it—if it’s a sled for kids—or a pair of metal-edge downhill skis if adults might use it. Use stout, short screws and big washers to avoid pull-thru. Then you glue foam-padding to the inside of the tub. Apparently the resulting sled goes superfast, straight and far, but good luck turning with it. Looks like a fun project with the kids when hitting the slopes isn’t possible. Project: Homemade World’s Best Sled! [Out Your Backdoor via Make] More »
How Do You Prepare Your Car for Driving in the Winter?
5:00AM Tamar Weinberg | Many of you might have already experienced your first snowfall of the season, and it’s far from over. How do you prepare your automobile for winter? Weblog Dumb Little Man suggests ten tips, from ensuring that your windshield wipers give you maximum visibility on the road to inspecting your antifreeze to adding a protective layer of wax to your car to prevent rain, snow, or salt from wearing down your car’s paint. What else do you do for your car before the season gets really chilly and the snow begins to fall heavily? Let’s hear your tips in the comments. 10 Tips to Prep Your Car for Winter Driving [Dumb Little Man] More »
DIY Window De-Icer On-the-Cheap
9:00AM Adam Pash | For many of us, along with winter comes an endless expanse of mornings spent freezing our fingers off scraping ice from our windshields. Rather than walking that chilly road again this winter, the Dollar Stretcher web site suggests several DIY solutions for keeping your windshield ice-free this winter. For example: To prevent your car’s windows/mirrors from icing up… treat the windows before you go to bed each night. The window treatment can be made up of 3 parts vinegar to 1 part water and placed in a spray bottle… [and] will prevent ice from forming. From other posts in the thread, it sounds like rubbing alcohol can be substituted for vinegar, and the solution can be applied either before or after the ice has formed. Photo by DJ Curly. Homemade Window De-Icer [Dollar Stretcher via DIY Life] More »
