Make Your Apartment Feel Like A Home

Does your apartment feel like your home yet?  We have four great tips to help you get that homey feeling that you are looking for.  Lighting, artowrk, and a few other things will help you achieve your goals.  Read this blog and get excited about coming home!  You can learn more at Apartment Therapy.


The Right Lighting: Lighting is one of the quickest ways to change the feeling of a room. If you are only using your overhead lights, you are missing an important part of the equation. By having different levels and placement, you can create an atmosphere that's comfortable and cozy for guests to relax in.


Well-Chosen Artwork: What you have on the wall should reflect who you are, what you like, and what makes you happy every day. The artist or the source is less important than how it makes you feel. Plus, artwork adds a different layer to your walls — color and interest. Don't forget that non-traditional things can be stand in for art as well. When framed and/or put in a place of honor, an instrument, postage stamps, or shoes also show your personality.


Fill It With People: The most important thing in the home are the memories you create while living there. If you work at all hours of the night, and only return home to sleep, then those warm fuzzy feelings about your abode are few and far between. Similarly, open your doors to others and invite them to share your space.


Personalized Details: All of us have lived in boring, blank boxes at some point — whether it’s a dorm room, or a standard builder-grade home, that aren’t perfect, might be temporary, or are just we were are at that moment in our lives. Even with standard and predictable finishes, it’s easy to tweak your space enough to make it reflect your personal taste. If you are renting, stick to swapping out hardware or painting furniture. These needn’t be large massive changes, but small tweaks and choices that make you smile and feel good about where you are.

Happy Thanksgiving!

We hope you have a great Thanksgiving with loved ones!

26 Easy Household Winter Tips

We hate the cold.  We wish it could be summer all the time.  However, we have found 25 great tips to keep you warm this winter through the harshest storms.  Apartment Therapy has some great ideas that will help you stay nice and toasty through the cold winter months.

1. The battle with winter is a long one, fraught with snow and cold. If you need a couple more arrows in your quiver, check out these 25 household practices that help you keep you warm as the temperatures drop, save time in the freezing mornings before work, and hopefully conserve energy during the dark months. Individually they don't sound like much, but collectively they help you kick winter's butt to the curb.
2. Cover your windshield wipers with old socks before storms. Ice won’t build up and make it hard to use them. Similarly, cover rearview mirrors with plastic bags.
3. Park your car facing east to take full advantage of the sun.
4. Make your own windshield washer fluid from 1 quart alcohol, 1/2 cup water, and 1/2 teaspoon regular dish detergent.
5. After taking off wet shoes and boots, stuff them with newspaper to absorb moisture quickly.
6. To take advantage of passive solar, open up curtains during the day to let the sunshine and heat in.
7. Prevent drafts by installing foam cutouts behind outlet covers on the walls.
8. Make your own hand warmers with resealable plastic bags and ice-melt pellets.
9. Cover your windows with bubble wrap for added insulation.
10. Reverse your ceiling fan to keep warm air at floor level versus in your stairwell or ceilings.
11. Pre-warm your bed with either a hot water bottle or electric blanket. Stick your pjs in there to get them all toasty before you get changed for bed.
12. Wrap foam pipe insulation around the bottom of exterior doors to prevent drafts.
13. Fill a shallow plastic tray with rocks to store your boots when you come in from the snow.
14. Spray pipe exterior and joints with WD-40 during the winter to help prevent them from bursting.
15. Use tin foil behind your radiator or heating vents to reflect heat back into the house.
16. Use a disposable razor to get rid of your sweater pills.
17. Make DIY boot toppers out of old sweaters.
18. Make homemade sidewalk and driveway de-icers.
19. Rig some thermal curtains to temporarily install over your windows.
20. Make your own fire starters.
21. Skewer a dryer sheet with the bristles of your hairbrush, and leave it on to get rid of static while you brush your hair.
22. Spray your shovel with nonstick cooking spray, or WD-40, before you use it so snow doesn't stick to it.
23. Attach mitten clips to your cuffs (and loop around your insole) to keep your pants down while wearing boots.
24. Save money by closing the heater vents in rooms you aren’t using.
25. When faced with a frozen lock, use heat rub intended for sore muscles. Hand sanitizer (with 60% alcohol) or a key heated by a lighter, is also rumored to do the trick.
26. Keep moisture in the area with a teakettle or saucepan of water boiling on the range or wood stove. Add mulling spices for a nice scent in addition to the more humid air.

Prevent Soggy Pie Crusts

The holiday season is quickly approaching.  What do you like to make for those family dinners at the end of the year.  We have provided you some tips on how to make the perfect pie crust.  This crust will be delicious and perfect for your favorite pie.  You can learn more at The Kitchn.


1. Blind Bake

The most common way to ward off a soggy pie crust is by a process called blind baking. Blind baking means you pre-bake the crust (sometimes covered with parchment or foil and weighed down with pie weights to prevent the crust from bubbling up) so that it sets and crisps up before you add any wet filling.

You can fully blind bake a pie until it's completely cooked, which you have to do when adding a cooked filling like custard or mousse, or you can partially bake the crust before adding the filling and finishing the baking. In either case, blind baking goes a long way in keeping everything nice and crisp!

2. Brush With Egg

Another way to prevent a soggy crust is to basically seal the surface of it to make a barrier between the crust and the filling. Brushing the surface of the unbaked crust with beaten egg or egg white mixed with water before adding the filling means that as it bakes, the proteins in the egg will form a moisture barrier over the crust and provide a layer of protection.

3. Brush With Chocolate

Along the same vein as brushing unbaked crust with egg to make a moisture barrier is the tasty method of brushing blind-baked crust with chocolate to make things even crispier. Let your fully blind-baked crust cool completely, then brush with melted chocolate and let that set before adding your filling. Not only do you end up with a super-crisp crust, but you get a sweet bonus layer of chocolate too!

4. Bake on a Hot Baking Sheet

Pie crust gets light, flaky and crisp when the heat of the oven melts the little nubs of fat inside the crust quickly and so that they form steam that puffs the crust up. You want that process to happen quickly so that the crust sets before the filling has much of a chance to seep in and make things soggy. Place a baking sheet in the oven as it heats, then place your pie dish directly on that hot baking sheet — this little extra boost of heat will do wonders in terms of getting the crust to cook and set quickly.

5. Keep Moisture Out

One of the easiest ways to prevent a soggy pie crust is to keep the moisture out in the first place. Toss your fruit with sugar, let it sit for awhile so the juices start to come out, then strain out those juices. You can discard those juices or boil them down into a syrup that gets tossed back in with the fruit before baking.

And if you're doing a double-crust fruit pie, don't forget to cut a little circle in the middle or slits in the top crust — it's important to create a vent where steam from the filling has a chance to escape instead of settling into the crust.