Interested in adding a special touch to your house painting? Stencils have been used for hundreds of years by not-so-artistic DIY home painting folks who want to turn out beautiful designs without too much effort. Unfortunately, stenciling doesn’t always turn out like it should, so let me share a few painting tips that I’ve learned over the years.
Use a stencil brush. You’re going to be tempted to use a regular paintbrush, but this is not a good idea! Stencil brushes use short round bristles to give better coverage, whereas regular brushes are too long and the bristles tend to slip under the edge of the stencil, messing up your design. To use the stencil brush, load lightly with paint and stipple the area, dabbing at the area to be painted rapidly. A small roller can work for larger, same color stencils, too.
Do the edge first. Make sure you start around the edge of the design and then fill in the middle. In fact, if you want a nice shaded effect, you can use less paint in the middle, making the edges darker. This works particularly well for flowers and leaves.
Don’t overdo it. One of the best painting tips for DIY home painting and stenciling is to avoid painting too thickly. If need be, do two thin coats and you’ll have much better end results with your home painting.
Use tape. You might think that you can hold the stencil steady with one hand and dab with the other, but it’s not worth having a wobbly design running across the wall to find out. Use low tack or painters masking tape to hold the stencil to the wall. You’ll get the best results if you measure first to make sure you’re going in a straight line, since it is easy to slip a little as you work and create a poor effect.
Using a stencil really doesn’t require a lot of talent, but it does require precision. Unlike other house painting areas, you will need to be very careful with this type of DIY home painting. These painting tips will help you get great results.
Do it yourself home repair can save you a lot of hassle, as well as money, but only if you have the right tools. There’s nothing worse that struggling to strip a wire with your teeth or tighten a bolt with scissors. DIY home repair requires tools, so if you’re serious about DIY home improvement, you’re going to need a tool box.
There are a number of useful tools to have on hand for DIY home improvement projects, but certain DIY home repair jobs require certain tools more than others. Your do it yourself home repair kit should have the following tools in it:
Screwdrivers: Skip the frustration of using a penny to turn a screw and get yourself a couple of good screwdrivers at the very least. If you can, pick up a full set or get one that has interchangeable heads.
Adjustable wrench: Any DIY plumbing jobs are going to require this one. An adjustable wrench saves you having to store an entire kit, though this can be good if you have the space and the money for this.
Clamps: There are so many uses for clamps that I won’t even start to go into them, but we’ll leave it at the fact that you need to have at least two on hand, preferably more. Trust me, they come in very handy.
Pliers: Needlenose pliers in particular are useful for working on electrical connections, but they can be used anywhere you need to grip something in a small space. Regular pliers are also very handy to have on hand.
Hammer and chisel: These could technically be two tools, but they really do go together and neither has a good substitute. Make sure you have both in your tool kit.
Of course, there are many other tools that you should have on hand, but these essentials will help you deal with most common do it yourself home repair issues. When you have a DIY home repair emergency in the middle of the night, you want to have what you need on hand, so stock your DIY home improvement tool kit well.
If you’re planning on some home electrical DIY to do some electrical household wiring and you come to the right place. We will give you some electrical how to information in the following weeks.
To start with you must be aware of safety. Since no one will be there to check what you’re doing safety wise, play it safe and turn off the power to whatever you’re working on before you start working on it. You have either a circuit breaker panel or fuse box. Locate the circuit you want to break the flow of electricity to an easier switch off the circuit breaker or pull out the fuse. In case of the circuit breaker is also wise to put some tape over top of these which to prevent accidents.
Voltage tester is a must-have
The first tool I recommend owning would be a voltage tester, these are quite inexpensive in its basic form and can grow
in price in more sophisticated versions which you probably don’t need. This tool is good for identifying a live circuit. Knowing this helps you to identify if the wall plug works or not. Also this will help you identify if the wire to the switch or the wall plug works or not.
For twisting and manipulate wire in tight places
Wire nuts to connect electric wires
Another important tool is a screwdriver. A good quality screwdriver has a case hardenedand on it to retain grip for turning, also the handle and shaft should be guarded with insulation to protect against accidental shorting or shock.
You will need a utility knife. You will use this a lot cutting wires. You will need this to strip shielding off wires (the plastic cover on the wire).
Of course you will need needle nose pliers to hold the wire with and manipulate the wire, you’ll get better grip of the wires in tight places, you can remove the metal lockout discs in the power boxes in the even come with a built-in wire cutter. This new most fire should also have shielding on the grip.
Another very needed tool would be a wire stripper. The wire stripper after you’ve cut the wire to length can strip the insulation off to the bare wire. This is definitely a worthwhile investment, they are good.
Of course you will need some electrical tape, this is to insulate any exposed bare wire and also do over top of in conjunction with your wire nuts
You will need also wire nuts also known as Marretts or Marr connectors, they are made to fit different gauges of wires like: a small one/black color/16 to 22gauge, a medium-size one/orange/14 to 22gauge. There are a few more just consult the store to which wire size you have.
Wiring the light diagram
Okay, so you went out and bought a new light for your ceiling. You have been dreaming about a new light on your ceiling since you bought your home. You decide, it can’t be a very big job to install it yourself so you go ahead with installing it.Here we will talk about “wiring light” to your ceiling. This will be one of our electrical tips today.
Simple wiring the light diagram.
Wiring light securing with nipple
The first thing you should do before attempting to work on any electrical repair is find your circuit breaker or fuse box identify which one of these items will disable the flow of electricity to what you’re working on whether you’re doing ceiling fan wiring or any kind of wall electrical repair. Either pull out the fuse or turned off the circuit breaker and for some extra added safety put some tape over top of the circuit breaker switch on the off position. This will ensure if you need to do any resetting during the time you’re doing any wall electrical repair you won’t be tampering with the disabled breaker accidentally turning on the circuit.
Removing your old fixture from the ceiling should be a fairly simple job. This will expose the electrical box containing the wires to connect the light fixture. You should see three wires coming from this to covered wires usually black and white and one bare copper wire the bare copper wire will be screwed to the metal of the fixture creating a good ground. The other two wires also referred to as “Marrette” or “Marr connector” will be connected with wire nuts
Sometimes in older homes that have a lot of history of electrical work done on them might not have the proper connectors. I will talk later about this in another post.
The junction box has a cross plate called the “strap” running across from one end to the other with a threaded tube called a nipple which is not indicated in this diagram which is adjustable coming out of it. This threaded tube is the actual support for the fixture (most common type of light fixtures)
it is safe to touch anything in this electrical junction box because you turned off and circuit breaker. You can unscrew these wire nuts from the wires holding a little of everything not to drop the light. You might need a screwdriver to unscrew the bare copper wire that is used for grounding the fixture.
Inspect the wires that you’re going to be connecting that they are all in good condition and not bare in any spot, this could cause a short. Also ensure you have the correct wire nuts to reassemble the circuit. If you have stranded wire make sure the strands are all twisted into a rope first, this allows the wire nut to twist on smoothly. This is done by putting the two bear pieces of wire that all to each other and fitting up against each other snugly, placing the wire nut carefully over the exposed wire pair and then twisting and pushing lightly until the wire nut grabs traction and starts threading on to the wires. I generally cut enough wire shielding away from the wire so that it is still inside the plastic part of the wire nut.
Once you have your two live wires connected then connect your bare ground wire back to the electrical junction box. For added insurance I generally take some electrical tape and wrap both wire nuts down wire strands. This ensures the nut doesn’t become free and loosens up.
Make sure the cross plate that holds the lamp fixture will be properly adjusted for depth to accommodate the lamps base. To do this with your two fingers twist the nipple in or out as needed.
Make sure that you have placed the tightening nut first on the wire from your lamp and before the base. So holding the lamp bring it to the ceiling place the base over the nipple then holding the base in place tighten up the nut. If the nut is something like an acorn nut if you keep on twisting the nut in a little twisted nipple back far enough to tighten up the base securely.
