courtesy of kakeyzz

how often do you run into a plant that you just have got to have, but you can’t find any information on it, so are not really sure what kind of care it needs

I do that all the time. I have a got-to-have-it twitch as far as plants go, and I often end up with some exotic looking plant I have no Idea how to care for.

Plants are the Strangest People published a post with a default list for how to care for un identified tropical plants. I have printed it, and will plop it on my fridge for easy access. You should to.

photo credit creative commons license akeg

I am sure a lot of the readers and users of this site are DIY mechanics, priding in the good upkeep of their cars, which may also include frequent oil changes, enabling great gas mileage and car preservation.

However - there is a serious catch her - What do you do with the used oil? and does your car really need as frequent oil changes as you give it?

Please read Practical Environmentalist’s posts Save the planet with motor oil - I can guarantee you a very informative and important read.

courtesy of steeljam

Taking measurements is kind of a pain, especially if you need to be accurate - Like for hanging pictures in a line, or putting multiple knobs on cabinet doors and so on.

Somehow, it never quite works out straight, no matter how often you measure and remeasure.

I am one of those people with the annoying ability to see crooked really quickly and it bothers the hell out of me - unfortunately, I have a hard time meeting my own standards when it comes to straight or even spaced and so on.

In the garden I use a measuring string (a string that is pre measured) and I used it to space things that I want to space evenly, but for some very strange reason or other I never thought of making a jig like this for hanging pictures on the wall.

I like pictures or other objects that I hang on the wall to be grouped together geometrically, and it doesn’t look good if its not accurate, so I have a lot of stuff waiting to be hung, and no courage at all to go ahead and hang these things on my wall.

I just had an Ah ha moment though, while reading DIY Insanity. Gene spent time on making a jig in order to put kitchen cabinet knobs on in the right places. Genius.

I really don’t know why I didn’t think of that before!

creative commons license annthelibrerian

I have been MIA for a while, very busy with work and personal stuff, as well house hunting. We are being as budget consious as possible with this chore, which makes it all the more difficult. It could be very tempting to get a more expensive house that is tailor made or nearly so, with a perfectly manicured garden, but it seems that the route we will be taking is buying a small house, that we will add onto a bit with not much of a garden to speak of.

This makes thing a bit more complecated, but also potentially better, and more fun is away, because we will have to opertunity to make the house more “our own”.

When I go to see a house I take basic measurements and then sketch it out on checkered paper, and mess around with to scale cut outs of our furniture to get a sense of the space…. I never thought to do the same with the garden, till I  read this post on Tiny old house.

They to have a fixer-upper, and lately they have been turning there overgrown yard into a garden. They posted there garden plans, and I don’t know why that didn’t occur to me before - as a way to plan my new garden.

The thought of dealing with thinking up the addition to the house is one that I do easily, and keeping up someone Else’s garden and changing it a bit here and there, also.

But thinking it up from scratch is something I  have never done, and never thought to draw plans for… Silly me :-)

The Glue industry has been hit with a wave of humor, with Locktite naming its new boy on  the block sumo glue

Toolmonger writes all about it.