How To: Prepare for a Project Involving Sanding...Lots of Sanding

Prepping for the big kitchen project this week was not fun, not fun at all. But I'm so glad we did because we hopefully will save ourselves a lot of unnecessary dusting by adequately preparing for the project.

First, we moved everything we could from the kitchen, dining room and living room, down to the basement.


Talk about feeling claustrophobic.

Then, we covered everything that had to stay upstairs with dropcloths of all shapes, sizes, and materials.


Finally, since our kitchen has two entrances and a cut out, we duct-taped more plastic drop cloths all three access points to keep as much dust in the kitchen as possible.


Finally, we turned off the air conditioning in the house. Thankfully it's been a cool couple of days in the DC area.

Here's hoping all this prep truly pays off!

Will post the new kitchen walls as soon as the house is put back together again. Anyone else in the middle of a big project?

How To: Remove a Satellite Dish from the Roof

On Saturday morning we turned our backyard into a satellite dish graveyard. That's because last week heavy winds knocked over one of the two dishes on our roof and ever since we've wanted to murder DirecTV. Of course the banging dish was just outside of our bedroom window so we've been sleeping in the guest room for the past few nights. You'd think the satellite company would have a service for removing unused dishes from previous customers... but if you thought that... you'd be wrong!


Our annoyance (and lack of zzz's) spurred us into action. We went to Home Depot at 8:00 am Saturday morning and rented a 24' extension ladder so that Jared could climb onto the roof to remove both dishes. Thankfully no one was hurt in the process and we had the ladder back an entire hour before it was due. (FYI: renting a ladder of this size cost us $28 for four hours which made more sense for us than spending $200 to buy one.)


I think Jared actually enjoyed tossing both dishes off of the roof. May they rest in peace.


Since removing the mount plates would leave a series of exposed holes in the roof we decided to leave them in place for the time being. Jared did some Google searches to see what people typically do to remove these old dishes and most sources suggested leaving the plates in place if they weren't a problem.


However, if the plate is loose or already missing some of the bolts, you will be better off removing them and patching the holes. In most cases the bolts used to secure the dish to your house will have punctured several layers under your roofing. Leaving them exposed will likely cause water damage in the future.


We used Henry Wet Patch Roof Cement to fill in the holes. It came in a caulk tube which made it easy to dispense (I assume, after all Jared was the one on the roof.)

Finally, the eye sore(s) are gone, baby gone. No more useless dishes on our roof and the rickety-rackety, pots and pans-like banging we've been living with are a thing of the past!

How To: Remove Wax from a Candle Holder

Here's a quick trick I learned from my Dad: After a dinner party all of your votive candles have burned down leaving you with wax stuck in your candle holders. Before your start trying to dig them out, pop them in the freezer...
That's right, just stick the candle holder right into the freezer. A few minutes is all it takes.
Then simply use a knife to easily pop the wax out. Finally, use a dry paper towel to wipe out any waxy residue and your candle holder is ready for another round. It doesn't get much easier than that!