5 Holiday Hosting Disasters and How to Avoid Them

Imagine you’re preparing to host your annual holiday party, and you’re past  the point of no return. The veggies and meats have been bought. Guests are  already braving busy airports and crowded highways to get to your home—and then  your oven won’t turn on. Your home-cooked meal has quickly turned into a  microwave dinner.

 

That’s just one of many hosting nightmares that can end your holiday party  before it even begins. Thankfully, some of the most damaging mishaps easily can  be avoided. We collected five of the most prevalent issues and give you  preventative tips to keep your holiday party on track.

Problem: The oven doesn’t heat

For any holiday occasion, the oven is the most important appliance in your  house. If it fails to work, the centerpiece of your meal could go from roasted  beef, ham, duck, or Tofurky to Peking Duck from the local Chinese takeout  joint.
How to avoid:

• There are any number of reasons a stove can break, but one common cause of  disaster is easy to prevent. Don’t self-clean your oven until AFTER the  holidays. You risk blowing a fuse or a thermostat, and tracking down an oven  technician around the holidays can be tough.

Problem: The kitchen sink clogs

The day after Thanksgiving is the busiest of the year for plumbers. The prime  cause of this clog-a-thon is the mistreatment of drains when cooking holiday  feasts. We hope your Thanksgiving went well, and that you avoid clog-a-thons for  the rest of the holidays.
How to avoid:

• Fats and cooking oils can solidify in your pipes, so never dispose of them  in your kitchen sink.

• If you have a garbage disposal, make sure it’s running before anything goes  in it, and never feed it any stringy, fibrous, or starchy foods like poultry  skins or potato peels.

• To fix, don’t rely on chemical drain-clearing products that can harm your  pipes. Use a snake instead, available for $15 at your local hardware store. Best  to keep one on hand.

Problem: The heat goes out

As the party’s host, you’re supposed to hang guests’ coats—not apologize to  them for having to keep them on. A lack of heat can stop a holiday party dead in  its tracks.
How to avoid:

• The key to avoiding freezing your party to a standstill is regular  maintenance of your HVAC. Every 90 days, a new one-inch pleated furnace filter  should be installed. If you haven’t done it in a while, now’s a good time to  replace it.

• Also inspect insulation on refrigerant lines that are leading into your  house. Replace them if they’re missing or damaged.

Problem: The toilet stops up

Toilets have a way of clogging up at the worst times, such as during parties  and when you have overnight guests. This is especially true if you have a  low-flow toilet from the early 1990s.
How to avoid:

• Don’t flush anything other than sewage and toilet paper down the toilet. And  there’s nothing wrong with putting up a polite note to remind your guests to do  the same.

Problem: The fridge doesn’t cool

Without a properly functioning refrigerator, your meat could get  contaminated, your dairy-based treats could go sour, and you may not be able to  save your yummy leftovers. To avoid discovering a warm fridge after it’s too  late, take these simple precautions.
How to avoid:

• Get a thermometer for your refrigerator to make sure each shelf stays below  40 degrees and you can be aware of any temperature changes.

• Also make sure the condenser coils located on the back of the unit or  beneath it are free to breathe. Coils blocked from circulating air by cereal  boxes atop the fridge, or dirtied by dust or pet hair can prevent a fridge from  keeping cool.

Read more:  http://www.houselogic.com/home-advice/home-thoughts/holiday-hosting-tips/#ixzz1gKLyAhcC

9 Ways to Keep Lid on Energy Bills

‘Air leaks can infiltrate surprising places’, says Paul Bianchina, Inman News™.

No one likes wasting money, especially in these tough economic times. So it certainly makes sense — dollars and cents — to make a small investment of time and supplies to close up those heat-wasting air leaks around your home. It’ll pay back big dividends in reduced energy bills and a warmer, more comfortable house this winter. So let’s look at some of the areas where those drafts may be lurking, and see how to take care of them.

 

 

1. Doors and windows: This should be an obvious one. If you can see gaps between your siding and your windows or exterior doors, close them up with a bead of clear or paintable acrylic latex caulk. Larger gaps can be filled with foam backer rod before applying the caulking.

2. Exterior penetrations: Some of these areas are going to be obvious, while some may take a little bit of searching. Some examples of exterior penetrations where air can leak into the house include exterior faucets, dryer vents, exterior electrical outlets, exterior light fixtures, holes that have been drilled for phone and TV cables, conduit penetrations, exit points for plumbing drains, and penetrations for air conditioning lines. Closing these penetrations may require a variety of different techniques, including caulk, expanding spray foam, or, in the case of electrical boxes and fixtures, specific gaskets that are designed to fit the boxes.

3. Exhaust-vent covers: Dryer vents, range hood vents, bath fan vents, and other interior ventilation equipment typically terminate outside the house in a plastic or metal cover that has one or more louvers on it. The louvers are designed to be in the closed position whenever the fan is not in use, so that outside air doesn’t leak in. Check all of these louvers to be sure they’re closing completely, with no air leaks. If they aren’t, you can adjust the spring tension to hold them closed more tightly; add foam weather-stripping tape for a more air-tight seal; or replace the entire vent cap with a new one.

4. Gaps around interior vents and recessed lights: Inside your home, heated air can be leaking out around that same ventilation equipment, where vent pipes pass through the walls or ceiling, or where vent covers meet wall and ceiling surfaces. Recessed light fixtures can also be real air-leakers. Around the vent pipes and recessed light cans, seal any gaps with caulking. For the vent covers and recessed light covers, remove the covers, then adjust the springs and/or add foam weather-stripping tape to create a tight seal between the cover and the ceiling.

5. Heat-duct penetrations: Gaps around heating-duct cans where they pass through the floor or wall allow cold air to enter from the crawl space, while gaps around ceiling-duct cans allow heated air to escape into the attic. To close those drafts, first remove the register, then use a combination of caulking and/or metallic duct sealant tape to close any gaps between the sheet metal cans and the floor, wall or ceiling surface.

6. Fireplaces and wood stoves: Lots of gaps can occur around these appliances. With a conventional fireplace, keep the damper closed except when burning a fire to prevent heated air from escaping up the chimney. Consider investing in a set of air-tight doors, which close off the air leaks and also make your fires more efficient. Look for gaps around wood stove and gas fireplace flue pipes, and air leaks around masonry chimneys. Use a metal collar if necessary around flue pipe penetrations, and seal gaps with heat-resistant sealant specially formulated for this application.

7. Attic and crawl space hatches: These can be real air losers if they’re not weather-stripped, so take care of that with some foam tape. Make sure the hatches are insulated as well.

8. Interior doors to unheated spaces: If you have any interior doors that lead to unheated spaces, including basements, garages or attics, be sure the doors are weather-stripped to prevent air leakage. If possible, replace older, hollow-core doors with solid-core or, better yet, insulated metal doors.

9. Sill plates and penetrations: This one’s not as easy to deal with, but it’s well worth the effort to try to do whatever you can with it. Air can leak both into and out of the house through gaps where the sill plate meets the foundation or the siding, and around plumbing and wiring penetrations drilled through wall plates in various areas. If you have a gap between your siding and the bottom of your exterior wall, especially in older homes where the use of sill sealers was not a common practice, consider closing up this big air gap with a bead of caulking or expanding foam. In the basement, crawl space and attic, if you can access any of the pipes and wires that pass through the wall plates, seal the penetrations with expanding foam.

 

 

Remodeling and repair questions? Email Paul at paulbianchina@inman.com. All product reviews are based on the author’s actual testing of free review samples provided by the manufacturers.

Source: Inman News™