So where to start? A good place to start is to consider the least used rooms in your property. It could be a utility room or an adjoining garage. Knocking down a wall can transform such a rarely used area into a kitchen or living room extension which can bring a great deal of value to your property. Consider also your lighting and plumbing. Dimmer switches can transform ugly bright rooms into cosy, warm rooms just via a dimmer dial – it’s just a dimmer switch, but showing such a pleasant ambience in your home makes the prospective home buyer feel more relaxed! Perhaps your home doesn’t have a downstairs bathroom? Then get one put in where your utility room is – once more this can add a great deal of value to your house.

Possibly your 4 bedroomed house could be converted to 3 bedroom by taking a wall down, and making a much bigger room. This may sound slightly odd, but in reality larger rooms will give you a better sale value, and rather often individuals use a 4th bedroom strictly as a room to store stuff in (meaning it’s not of great importance).

Next up is the garden. Do you have a shed? If not, consider installing one in your garden. Why is this of particular importance? Well, here is one place where you can keep all your stuff that’s clogging up your spare bedroom / garage / utility room. Having a shed helps also with the gardening, and enthusiastic gardeners (read: your prospective home buyer) like a shed in their garden. And get into gardening yourself! If your garden’s been untended, then mow the grass, plant some flowers, cut the lawn edges. Install some decking if you have some room. Just providing a beverage to a potential buyer out in your pretty garden can really help sell the place – viewers feel comfortable in such an environment – so your garden is very important to help raise the price of your property and help sell your home.

Where can you get help? You can’t do it all by yourself. Have a look online! A home and garden directory like homeandgardenlistings.co.uk has all kinds of home and garden websites listed there : including a directory of bathroom fitters, directory of builders, directory of painters and decorators, directory of general furniture suppliers, directory of bedroom furniture and beds suppliers etc.

These are just some basic points on increasing the cost of your house in these tricky times, but hopefully this will get you thinking!

For a few piles of firewood to get you through the cold winter months, there’s really no need to invest in expensive equipment. A simple single blade wood splitting axe is all you should need. The hand held simple log splitting ax uses a sharp blade and has a wedge shaped head which forces the log to split. For individuals handy with an wood splitting ax, one or two blows are all that are required. For individuals strong enough to enjoy some solid exercise, a basic log splitting maul is the perfect tool to use for log breaking.

For those who have need of a log splitter on a regular basis, investing in a hydraulic hydraulic log splitter may be the answer for you. There are a few options available when you’ve made the decision to buy a powered log splitter. Both vertical and horizontal manual wood splitters are sold and you’ll need to pick the one best to suit your needs. For on-site and outdoor use, wood splitters with gasoline powered or diesel engines are available. For home or workshop use, an electric manual wood splitter is ideal.

Although a powerful piece of equipment, hydraulic wood splitters basically work by using a piston to direct the log through a fixed blade.

The best log splitter is determined by its ability to complete the job fast and efficiently. A electric wood splitter, operating at peak performance can cut a jobs completion time by an incredible amount. When using a wood splitter, safety procedures are extremely important to guard the operator from injury.

Others should always be aware of the possibility of injury from wood debris, and remain clear of the manual log splitter when in operation. Injury can be avoided by avoiding loosely fitted clothing and jewelry, and wearing protective safety goggles.

Most individuals who work with wood regularly make the choice to purchase a electric log splitter. A manual log splitter can be used to split timber to be used for a variety of satisfying projects. Need to purchase a electric log splitter? You can find one wherever logging machinery can be purchased.

A honed finish is a satin surface with relatively little light reflection. It is specified for floors, thresholds and other locations where the presence of water might make a polished finish slippery, or where heavy traffic would wear off the polished finish.

As a rule, honed finishes are more susceptible to soiling than polished finishes, because a honed surface is slightly more porous and absorptive than polished finish. However, the honed finish is easier to restore because it will sustain harsher cleaning efforts.

Normal maintenance of honed finishes involves as-needed washing with clean water and mildly abrasive cleaners, which retain a pumice-type finish, while the cleaners remove soils. There are thick liquid cleaners and chlorine-bleach type scouring powders commercially available.

The marble should be wet with clean, hot water. Then using a mildly abrasive alkaline cleaner and stiff bristle brush, wash in overlapping, swirling strokes. Suds can be left to stand for several minutes to permit the bleaching agents to work on the stains and dirts. Rinse thoroughly and dry with cotton, cotton flannel, burlap or chamois skin. Wipe well to avoid streaking.

If further cleaning is required, use a special treatment or make a paste to the consistency of syrup using a mildly abrasive alkaline cleaning powder if necessary. Rinse thoroughly and dry.

The products for the maintenance of Honed Marble and all other stone is available from http://www.marblemasteruk.com/shop

You may publish this article in your ezine, newsletter on your web site as long as the byline is included and the article is included in it’s entirety. I also ask that you activate any html links found in the article and in the byline. Please send a courtesy link or email where you publish to: admin@marblemasteruk.com

About the Author

Edward Green owns and operates the highly successful Marble Master Ltd company. Marble Master specializes in Restoration and Refinishing of all types of natural stone and consultancy services to Architects, Restoration Companies and Interior Designers. http://www.marblemasteruk.com

Cottage gardens were originally constructed to utilize every bit of growing space for family needs. This meant, flowers, fruit, herbs and vegetables were packed together into even the smallest plots. One tip is to incorporate wildflowers and herbs as well as the more traditional cottage garden plants. Plant in clumps
with large blocks of color to introduce rich patters of color and movement. Also, don’t restrict yourself to planting tall plants in the back, with smaller ones in front. Mix some of the taller plants in amongst the middle planting area as well.

You should grow hollyhock beside walls and fences, plant climbers, such as clematis and roses, in amongst the hedges and trees, or up wall and fences. Annuals can fill in between gaps in the planting.

You will find many of the flowers that are featured in traditional cottage gardens are self-sowing, so leave
old flower spikes intact for self-seeding.

All gardens require care and attention and cottage gardens are no exception. You will need to do frequent deadheading in order to encourage a long season of blooming flowers. Divide and replant where appropriate depending on the plant, and, of course, the weeding necessary in any garden.

The first step in creating your cottage garden is to plan your layout. A classic cottage garden has a straight path to the front door, a simple fence and perhaps an arc over the gate, the path or doorway. A more modern design has a curving path. You will need to decide which path option works best for you.

A climbing rose or a wisteria would be a good choice to adorn the wall by and above the front door. The path should be edged with plants that will spill over and soften the edges. You should have a few evergreen shrubs, this will provide green all year and will provide a background to show off your flowers, as
well as contrast with autumn foliage and your spring bulbs. Also in winter, your evergreen shrubs will provide color and inject interest while the rest of your garden is dormant.

Adding a tree will give scale to your garden, and lift the eye over the flowers. Deciduous trees have more than one season of interest since they provide autumn color, also many of them have beautiful flowers and fruits. Also, the frameworks of the branches provide height in winter and will not block the winter sunlight in small plots. Deciduous flowering shrubs will provide spring and summer pleasure, and some will give you
autumn foliage and berries in the winter.

I believe one cannot have a cottage garden without roses. There are so many types available now, whether heritage roses or the modern roses bred for ease of maintenance and disease resistance, you have your colors and degree of work you wish to commit. There are wonderful climbers to adorn arches,
doorways, fences and pergolas. Work roses into your overall scheme, and let them play their part, and they will contribute beauty, scent and structure to your garden.

Add different climbers, such as roses, clematis and others to the same support, whether it is a tree, arbor or fence. It is a good space-saving technique that creates colorful features for months on end and adds height to the garden.

Your landscaping should include more than plants. Add seating areas and containers to help you enjoy your garden. They contrast well with the flow and look of your plants. Containers are also a convenient way to add lots of extra color around buildings, seats and benches. Containers can be anything, use your imagination, for example, objects such as old chimney pots, old watering cans, and bottomless metal buckets can be recycled to make authentic, aged features that will add color and character to your cottage garden.

Your cottage garden should be a color palate of your imagination, blending plants, objects and colors into
a whole that is uniquely you. Add and change it through the years and watch it evolve.

Theresa is an avid gardener. For more information on creating lush, vibrant gardens visit her sites at Rose Gardens, Lawn and Garden and Garden.