Month: January 2022

Removing the Wall and Adding a Kitchen Island

Opening up the space between the kitchen and an adjoining room by removing the wall and adding a kitchen island can add a lot of space and usefulness to your home. Not only will removing the wall open the space up visually, but it can help to integrate your kitchen into the rest of your home, making entertaining easier and more enjoyable. If you are contemplating this kind of kitchen renovation, there are some things to keep in mind to help the project go smoothly.

Planning is Important

Removing a wall from your home is never a trivial task. If it happens to be a load-bearing wall, there are structural reinforcements you will need to make in order to allow it to be safely removed. Even when it’s not a load-bearing wall, many do-it-yourself homeowners don’t feel comfortable doing this part of the project by themselves. Unless you have the experience and know-how to do the job safely and correctly, hiring a contractor to remove the wall is often the best choice. The cost of the professional contractor is often trivial when compared to the expenses that can be incurred by a costly mistake.

A contractor could also help you if you need to make other structural changes in the kitchen to get the most use out of your new design, such as adding new electrical outlets or moving plumbing pipes. While this isn’t necessary in all cases, many people find that using a kitchen island for a sink or a stovetop is a great option. If you know you want to remove the wall but are having problems visualizing the best kitchen layout, a professional kitchen designer could also be helpful.

Building an Easy Kitchen Island with Cabinets

Once the wall has been removed, you’re free to start planning the kitchen island. Utilizing standard kitchen cabinets can be an easy way of adding a handy island that includes plenty of storage space. Upper cabinets are not as deep as standard base cabinets, so they are a great option for this project. By using these shallower cabinets, you will be able to place them back to back so that there will be cabinet storage on both sides. Of course you’ll have to build a base for the cabinets to sit on, since upper cabinets do not come with a toe kick. Add a countertop surface, cover it with laminate and you’ll have a great kitchen island. Or, use cabinets on only one side of the island, covering the exposed back with matching wood laminate. Then you can create the countertop surface with a deep overhang on the backside of the island. Add a few matching bar stools and you’ll have a great kitchen island with storage on one side and a convenient breakfast bar on the other.

Islands with Overhead Cabinet Storage

In some cases, you might also want to hang upper cabinets over your kitchen island for even more storage. Regular upper cabinets can be used for this purpose, placed back to back so that there are cabinets on both sides. Although this method does cut down on visibility between the two rooms, it can effectively double the amount of storage space provided by the island.

Whichever method you choose, you’ll have a great new kitchen feature that will add beauty and usability to your kitchen space.

A Filtered Water Dispenser Faucet System That’s Simple and Cheap

Getting a filtered water dispenser faucet system is one of the easiest and cheapest ways to supply your entire household with pure, healthy drinking water. But how can you tell which type is worth getting? This article will give you an idea as to what the ideal filtered water dispenser faucet system would be.

I’ve personally researched dozens of water dispenser faucet systems so figure out which ones offer the best quality and value. Some are obviously of better quality than others so it’s good to know what to look for in one before you start searching.

Obviously, you want to get a filtered water dispenser faucet system that removes as many contaminants as possible. The key contaminants that you want to make sure a device removes are:

*Chlorine – the primary chemical public water treatment plants use to disinfect our tap water. Much-needed, but that doesn’t mean we have to drink it too!

*Lead – comes from the pipes, fixtures, and soldering joints used to build the water systems in our homes.

*Volatile organic compounds (VOCs) – we use over 80,000 synthetic chemicals in our society today, and many of them eventually end up in our tap water thanks to runoff and floods.

*THMs – byproducts of chlorine reacting with synthetic chemicals in our tap water system.

*Herbicides and pesticides – used on our farms, which leaks into our drinking water thanks to agricultural runoff

The highest quality filtered water dispenser faucet systems use a multi-stage filtration process to remove contaminants. Since one means of filtration cannot remove all the necessary contaminants in our drinking water, multiple technologies need to be used.

The water dispenser faucet system that my family and I decided to invest in attaches right to our faucet, and the whole system actually sits underneath our sink so it’s not a huge eyesore. All we do is pull a little lever out on our faucet and our drinking water is filtered. It doesn’t get any easier than that!

For just pennies a day, you too can supply your entire household with pure. healthy drinking water. Not only will this protect your family’s health, but it will also IMPROVE your health since every function that happens within the body is improved by healthy water!

Making Your New Home Your Own

Moving to a new home is an exciting event. A new space to decorate can be fun and exhilarating and at times challenging. Finding a new home or apartment is a task that might come easily or might be a process that takes months to complete. Once you have found your new living space and are able to move in you may feel a relief to be in your new space. After the relief wears off, you will most likely desire to make the space ‘yours’.

You will move all of your furniture in and your photographs will be hung on the walls. You may find that the new location goes perfectly with the colors you already have, or you may need to paint or refloor to get the home decorating feel that you want. One easy way to make your house decorating come together is with the use of area rugs. Utilizing large rugs in large areas or runners in hallways can help to solidify your home decorating. Rugs come in all sizes, shapes, and colors. Rugs can define an area, add color to bland floors, or even tone down overly dramatic flooring.

Keeping in mind the size constraints or lack thereof in the room you wish to decorate will help you to determine what size rug to purchase. If you have an overly large room, make sure that the rug you use coincides with that. You wouldn’t want to place a diminutive rug in a massive room. It will end up looking out of place. Likewise, utilizing an overly large rug in a small room can make the rug seem more like wall to wall carpet than an actual rug. It is important to keep in mind the space issues you will be working with.

Another thing to keep in mind when decorating with area rugs is the furniture that will be in a room. If you will be placing furniture on top of the rug it will visually bring the space closer together. Placing furniture around the edges of a rug will make a room seem larger. Both of these decorating techniques are viable and can lead to attractive rooms. Both are very different than each other and could be used simultaneously in different areas of your home. If you are trying to create an intimate setting ringing furniture around your area rug will visually close the space and promote a more intimate gathering place.

Area rugs are visually appealing in many different places in your home and can be used in any room or space in your home. Moving into a new space is an adventure and a chance to create and decorate a new space to live in. Using rugs to help decorate and enhance your living space is a smart and attractive option. Making your new space into a space that reflects your decorating style and your tastes can be a fun and exciting process that can reflects your personality.