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If you’re like most people, cleaning your wallet rarely crosses your mind. That can leave it full of dirt, oils, bacteria, viruses and other grime. Avoid all that by learning how to clean a wallet made of any material. Clean Your Wallet at Least Once a Week A virus can live on paper money for an hour. However, if it mixes with mucus, the virus can live for 17 days. Icky stats like that mean you should clean your wallet at least once a week, and avoid touching money if you’re worried about getting sick....

In its third generation, Echo provides upgraded sound from its predecessors with a Dolby sound system that includes a 3-in. woofer and a 0.8-in. tweeter. This setup provides strong bass and clear sound that will fill a room. Speaking of rooms, the speaker also has a multi-room audio function that makes it possible for your tunes to follow you from room to room, if you have more than one speaker....

Woof woof! Thursday, August 26, is National Dog Day! To honor the occasion, the online pet supply store Chewy is holding a mega sale on all the things dogs love and need. Check out our favorite Chewy picks below that are sure to get tails wagging. Whether you need a pet ramp, waterproof car seat cover or an adorable Halloween costume for your pooch, now is the time to shop!...

Paint is paint, right? As long as you can live with the color, you should be able to slap any kind of paint on your home’s exterior trim — right? Wrong. You need exterior paint for exterior trim, for the same reason you can’t use interior wood filler to patch holes in your deck. Exterior paint must withstand tough weather conditions, so it’s formulated differently than indoor paint. There are also significant differences between various exterior paint formulations, so a paint that works on exterior walls usually isn’t the best choice for trim....

Andrey Suslov/Shutterstock You’ve probably heard a lot about home automation systems (aka smart home systems). A smart home automation system allows you to automate the electronic, electrical and other technology-based systems in your home using hardware and software. These smart home devices allow you to control things like wifi, door locks, security cameras, video door bells, smart lights, appliances, heating and cooling and other systems in your home. A smart hub can connect all the devices on your home automation system through a single piece of hardware, such as a computerized touchscreen panel mounted to a wall in your home, or software which can remotely control your home via computer, tablet or smartphone....

You are searching for the perfect plot of land, the perfect plan and the perfect contractor so you can move forward on building the custom home you’ve been dreaming of. Before you finalize all those details, though, there is another important task to take care of — lining up financing. Even if you’ve been through the financing process before, construction loans have a unique set of rules and requirements, and they are not one-size-fits all....

Paul Tessier/Shutterstock How To Tell if Pipes are Frozen Frozen pipes are a concern for anyone who lives in a climate where temperatures can drop below freezing during the winter months. At the very least, frozen pipes create inconveniences by blocking the flow of running water in a home. At their worst, frozen pipes have the potential to cause a plumbing catastrophe and major property damage. It’s essential that homeowners and property owners know how to spot any signs that their pipes have frozen, so that they can take the necessary steps to prevent any possible issues....

Decluttering seems to be on everyone’s mind this time of year. New Year’s resolutions are just around the corner, and spring cleaning won’t be far behind. But what if you’re already a pro at organizing? Have you thought about taking your skills to the next level by becoming a professional organizer? “Becoming a professional organizer takes more than being an organized person,” says Sarah Marie Dunn, a professional organizer and founder of Ready....

Plenty of households across the country are home to at least one dog. The American Veterinary Medical Association estimates 48.2 million households in the U.S. own one. While dogs bring a lot of joy, they also bring a lot of poop. Whether you’re a new pet owner or a longtime dog person, it’s smart to know how to address poop messes on different types of surfaces, indoors and out, so you can spring into action when accidents occur....

How to Patch Veneer A veneer is a thin layer of wood glued on top of the surface of things like doors, cabinets and other pieces of wood furniture. While some criticize veneers as a way to make cheap materials like particleboard resemble real wood, a veneer can also provide key structural benefits to a piece of furniture. Unfortunately, thin veneers can also be brittle and prone to chipping. And when a piece of veneer chips, it leaves an ugly blemish....

via amazon.com Check out this advice on high-definition TV wiring. How to Turn Your TV Into a Smart TV: Make Sure Your TV Has an HDMI Port The first thing you’ll want to check is that your TV has an HDMI port. You’ll need this port to hook up a smart media player. If your TV doesn’t have an HDMI port, you can buy an HDMI-to-RCA adapter that plugs into the red, yellow and white cables located on the back of your TV....

One of the first things people get confused about when trying to install an electrical outlet is which way is right side up! While it’s a topic heavily debated among electricians, the bottom line is, it doesn’t matter if you install the outlet with the ground hole up or down — technically. Installing Electrical Outlets: Ground Up or Down? The National Electrical Code (NEC) doesn’t require a certain direction. The NEC allows outlets to be installed with the ground plug hole facing up, down or sideways....

Wright Studio/Shutterstock In the beginning, a smart home was reserved for early adopters and the wealthy. That’s certainly not the case anymore! Read on to learn the history of smart home technology. First Smart Home Technology The modern beginning of smart home technology can be traced back to 1975 with the release of X10, a home automation platform that sends digital information through radio frequency bursts onto a home’s existing electrical wiring....

What is a painter’s tape? Painter’s tape is a special tape used to seal edges and boundaries between walls and trim. Painter’s tape is distinct from masking tape in that it uses different adhesives and it usually has a stronger backing paper for more strength. When applied to the wall it seals at the edge of the tape and prevents (generally) paint from seeping below the painter’s tape. This gives the edge of the paint a clean, crisp line....

What to Know Before Buying a Smart Sprinkler According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), up to 50 percent of the water used each day for lawns in the United States is wasted because of poor watering systems. On This Page Smart sprinkler controllers are an intelligent choice because they can prevent water waste and in turn save money on your water bill. Smart sprinkler controllers also make caring for your lawn much simpler....

The kindling had barely caught fire when the surrounding wood suddenly began to catch and burn as well. I’ve been an avid outdoorsman for decades, and this was by far the easiest campfire I’d ever started. I didn’t even need a fire-starter kit. Maybe there was something to this kiln-dried firewood after all. My late father liked to burn kiln-dried wood in the fireplace of his Indianapolis home. He only built fires on special occasions, and preferred kiln-dried firewood because it was simple to start and he needed less of it for an impressive fire....

The tape works well. But chemicals like wax and bug remover can destroy the tape’s bond to the car trim. Once that happens, car trim and emblems can eventually fall off. If you catch the problem early, you can remove the old tape, clean up the paint and reattach the car trim or decorative molding. It’s a DIY job that will cost about $25 and takes only a few hours. Here’s how to do it....

Remember Your Keys! You’ll always know where your keys are with this handy hint! To make Lego keychains, start by drilling a hole into the base of a Lego that is slightly smaller than the screw potion of an eyelet screw. Next, wind the eyelet screw into the lego. Thread a split ring through the hole and use it to attach keys. Mount the Lego board to a surface using your preferred method....

It’s not every day that a Frank Lloyd Wright-designed home goes on the market, and especially not one with the pedigree and square footage of the Fawcett Farm in Los Banos, Cal. Listed for $4.2 million, this 4,041-square foot home features seven bedrooms, six bathrooms and an opportunity to own a piece of architectural history. The excitement around this home sale is high, with coverage everywhere from House and Garden UK to the New York Post....

Dan Reynolds Photography/Getty Images According to the latest data from the U.S. Census Bureau, overall housing starts in the U.S. dropped six percent from December 2020 to January 2021. Starts on single-unit housing also fell significantly, dropping 12.2 percent over that same time frame. January’s decline in housing starts marks the first time since August 2020 that both overall and single-unit housing starts have not increased month-over-month. Industry officials say that the slowdown was likely caused by the return of spiking lumber prices, which began to swell in January before reaching new record highs in mid-February....