The Blackberry arrived at my house on Monday, but since I don’t want a data plan I can’t even get the Wifi to work because it’s not free with the Blackberry. So … I’m returning the Blackberry and I guess I’ll be picking out another phone or maybe evening buying another phone elsewhere. I was even looking at this incredible s phone that might suit my needs – it’s an HTC … but I’d probably need a Data plan with it, so I’ll have to check that out.

Right now I’m seriously thinking about turning in the Blackberry and getting a Nokia N8 or a Samsung Colby Pro. I’m leaning more towards the Nokia. Does anyone have experience with either of these phones or have any other suggestions … keep in mind that I likely won’t be getting a data plan with the phone but I’d like to take advantage of being able to use Wifi if an when it’s available.

We aren’t thinking of selling our home or moving – not just yet anyway … but we were curious as to how the home owners had renovated and decorated their homes.

One open house we visited was in a home that’s very similar to ours in design. Like us – they had knocked down the walls in the entry hallway, and the walls separating the living room, dinning room and main hallway in order to create an open living room dining room area. The only big difference was that they hadn’t taken out hte stairway hallway as we did. We felt that our main floor looked a little bigger or more open than the home we were in.

Another house that we visited was totally modern – stark white walls, white furnishings and just about everything stainless steel in the kitchen – including the Hansgrohe faucet. The house was a little too modern for my tastes, but I enjoyed looking around.

My husband and I are still renovating our home. Actually our renovations are stalled … so visiting a few open houses might have helped motivate us to finish our renovations and gave me some ideas for how we might decorate once we’re finally done our renovations … well if we ever manage to finish!

Do you ever go to open houses to just look around and get ideas?

I know the house hasn’t had any renovations … possibly since it was built in 1927 … but we were still curious to see if our neighbors family had decorated the house to prepare it for sale … Uh … the answer is NO. A big no!

The house is mostly empty … which is fine. I don’t think a house necessarily has to be dressed up when it goes up for sale … an empty house can allow prospective buyers to picture their own furnishings in the home.

However I don’t agree with what our neighbors family did. As I said they left most of the house empty, but they put what appears to be office furniture in the living room and dining room.

It just looks … odd.

They also took out all of the appliances! Why? I’m fairly certain that if you’re trying to sell a house for a good price you’re probably more likely to make a sale and get your asking price or higher if you have all the appliances (washer, dryer, fridge, stove etc) in place.

This is definitely an example of how not to sell a house! LOL

I guess it will be a while before we have new neighbors!

One my first attempt using the steam cleaner I went after the backsplash tiles in the kitchen, the stove and the fridge. The cleaner worked great on the stove and the fridge. It really got the grime out of the corners and crevices on both appliances.

The backsplash tiles in the kitchen were another matter. I used the scrubbing attachment on the steamer to try to clean the grout area between the tiles and while the grout did look cleaner where I worked at it they didn’t look anywhere near as clean as I’d hoped.

I guess I was hoping that using the steamer once on the tiles would remove years of grime that had built up on the grout. I guess I’m going to have to get some kind of grout cleaner to clean the grout between the backsplash tiles and then I can use the Shark Steamer to maintain the clean look.

One my next attempt to use the Shark steamer I’m going to tackle the bathroom. The grout in the bathroom isn’t that bad, but it could use a good cleaning. What I really want to clean in there is the silicone seal between the tub and the shower wall tiles. It looks like it has mildew in some areas and the steamer should at least help kill the mildew … and hopefully remove it too.

Actually almost all of our upstairs bathroom is tile of some kind or another. The tub/shower area is tiles up to the ceiling and then the walls have tile that goes from the ground up to about 4.5 feet in height. (our Kitchen is like that too .. I guess the former home owners really liked tile?). The bathroom floor has those tiny square floor tiles and yes, the grout between those tiles could use a very good cleaning too.

Hopefully I’ll find the time this weekend to get the steam cleaner out and try it out in the bathroom. It’s a shame that I’ve only used it once since I bought it.

Do you have a general purpose steamer that you use to clean the bathroom, tiles, appliance and perhaps even the floor? If so, what kind do you have and are you happy with it’s performance?

We bought a new TV because our 2004 DLP TV seems to be dying. We think there might be something wrong with the DMD board as the picture just freezes and goes black and white every now and then (about once a week). We know our DLP’s days are numbered!

We decided to replace the DLP rather than repair it because in the 6 years that we’ve owned it we’ve had to replace the light bulbs two or three times, had to replace the color wheel – at a total cost for all of these items of about one thousand dollars! Fixing the DMD board would cost approximate 800 to 1000 dollars … we just can’t see pouring more money into this TV. So we’ll put it in the basement and use it occasionally until it finally dies.

So … while we’re waiting for our new TV to come in (the store says it will be in on Friday!) we bought and hooked up a new home theater system. Lets just say that hooking up the new home theater system to the DLP wasn’t a piece of cake! It took hours and hours! Tested our marriage a bit too. LOL

Anyway …now the system is working and when we get the new TV we should only have to move a few wires (components) from one TV to the other and hopefully everything will work just fine.

One nice thing about the new home theater receiver is that we can hook up a special iPod dock to it and play music from the iPod through the receiver. We do have a 200 disk carousel CD player hooked up to the receiver but it’s old and I’m sure we’d get better sound if we used an iPod … or rather my husband is sure of that.

Of course … we don’t have an iPod (or the accessory docking station) so I spent a little bit of time earlier today looking at the various versions of ipods. I think if we’re going to buy one I’d get a classic iPod that has 160 GB of storage. We have a LOT of music on the computer and on CD’s – enough that we’d probably come close to filling up a classic iPod.

So before we go out and spend another $350 to $400 getting an iPod and the special docking station that works with our Yamaha receiver let me ask you a question – Have any of you run your iPod through your Home theater system? If you have, how is the sound?

The reason I’m asking is, if it’s not going to make a huge sound difference we might as well keep using our 200 disk CD carousel until it dies on us too. However, if there’s a major sound improvement (like full true 5.1 sound) we might go ahead and splurge to make our sound system complete.

You will realise that Breville juicers have features other manufacturers do not offer, when you compare Juice Fountain with Jack Lalanne juicer or Juiceman extractors for example. I think you will be happy to hear that this juicer costs about $30 less then some models from competition, like Juiceman juicers or famous Jack Lalanne’s Power Juicer we hear so much about.

There is a big 3 horsepower motor installed in a Breville juicer. This motor is 600 watts and has a maximum speed of 14,500 rpm’s. The fact that Breville won’t get stuck on some kind of fruit or vegetable is very useful, and this is because it has a powerful motor that is very important with juice extractors. Some people would say that the motor is a bit noisy, but it’s a trade-off for power and ease of juicing.

Using a Breville juice extractor is quite easy. First you just turn the unit on, take the fruit or veggies you want to juice and insert them into the shoot then take the plunger and push them down. And you have a fresh juice ready that you can store in fridge or drink right away. When you purchase any Breville juicer, it will come with some interesting recipes for you to try.

One the work is over, you can clean up your juicer with ease. They have used such an easy, common sense design that you probably won’t need to read the instruction manual to take it apart. Cleaning up the pulp is very quick and easy because a specially made brush is included with the Breville juicer. You should reassemble this juicer so you can store it with ease.

When you bring home fresh vegetables and add them to your dishes, you are offering  your family good quality food.  When you purchase bagged or canned vegetables from a supermarket, they often  contain sodium and preservatives.  Packaged vegetables are not as good for you as fresh vegetables.  But not many of us can take time to cut up fresh vegetables for each meal. 

One way to work around this is to cut up your vegetables for your next week’s menus with help from the Cuisinart 14-cups food processor unit.  It gives you quite a bit of capacity for seven or eight meal’s worth of vegetables, which you could put in freezer containers and thaw and use during the week.  This can save you time after a busy day and you can then include your fresh frozen vegetables in your recipes. Unlike commercially frozen vegetables, these will not contain preservatives.

Yet another task that can be done using the Cuisinart food processor 14 cup unit is preparing entire meals. You could use it in order to stir together sauces or gravy and while you’re at it, grind meat directly into the mix.  If you want to make homemade spaghetti sauce and want to blend everything together, you can do so by inserting fresh tomatoes and meat into your Cuisinart.  After that, you transfer it to a saucepan and simmer it, then freeze the leftovers for later use. 

Shredded and grated cheese is more expensive than a cheese wheel or wedge. You can save plenty of money by making fresh shredded and grated cheeses which require just moments in the Cuisinart food processor 14 cup unit. Shredding cheese by hand is neither quick nor easy, but when you shred cheese with the food processor, it takes a minute. 

Are you a salad lover? You can create a meal-sized salad by shredding lettuce tomatoes and more straight into the Cuisinart 14-cup food processor.  A salad that is undressed will stay fresh in an air tight container for a week. You can incorporate this into your meals for the week and serve the whole family their daily recommended allowance of vegetables. 

Whether you cook in large batches or just want to save time so that you can have more fresh food to eat, you can do so by using the Cuisinart food processor 14 cup unit. When you are finished saving time and money and enjoying great food, you can place nearly all the pieces into the dishwasher for easy cleaning.

Choosing the Best Home Security device

The truth is today there are more and more security devices on the market for your residence and this translates into you needing to take some of your time to evaluate which is the Best Home Security Device for your home. The following is a series of tips and points I hope will help you with your decision.

You’ll need to start your evaluation of what you need first by asking yourself some questions about your location, Is there a lot of crime? How accessible is your home to a burglar? Are there plenty of folks around?

Then consider just how important it is to you to have your home protected. For example, do you have elderly folks living alone during the day or for long periods of time? Have you got young children left alone in the home or is the home simply left unoccupied for long periods of time?

Once you have answered these questions you will have narrowed down your choices and hopefully you would have an idea by then of which security system you want to install.

Wired Security Systems

Yes older appliances still carry some popularity today; but we must remember that Wiring a home security system will be somewhat more challenging.

Unless you are a competent electrician or at least have the necessary knowledge to deal with home security wiring, your best route will be more than likely to hire the services of a professional.

It is imperative that home security system wiring be done in such a way that the wires are not visible by the naked eye, failing to do so could leave a window of opportunity open to a competent burglar.

It really isn’t all that difficult to find yourself in a bit of a mess with a wired home security system installation. Because of this one should seriously consider getting in professionals to do their installation if they do not have the necessary electrician skills.

Where It All Started

The HEPA air purifier traces its origins to the year 1940. It made its debut during the time of the Manhattan Project, when radioactive contaminants in the air were a serious concern. As time went by, air purifiers, which originally didn’t utilize a filter, were continuously improved to address the need for better quality of air in our modern society.

Today, air purifiers are installed in places where their function is considered essential, such as hospitals, rehab centers and even nuclear fuel plants. HEPA air purifiers are used by the pharmaceutical industry, in nuclear plants, the aerospace manufacturing sector, health care facilities, and even in computer chips.

This highly functional tool claims a 99.99% reliability rating, and has shown itself over time to be a very effective tool. Take a look at the testimonials found in just about any air purifier review, and you’ll see that HEPA air purifier reviews show that they are highly regarded just about everywhere.

How Does it Work?

The HEPA air purifier works in three ways: interception, impaction and diffusion. Because they are made up of randomly ordered fibers, they are very efficient with regard to their filtering capabilities. They trap airborne contaminants and all sorts of harmful particles that can lead to numerous illnesses and allergies.

The first step is the capture of a stream of air within one radius. The filters trap the air and the process starts. The next step is impaction, whereby large molecules are filtered by the tiny fibers within the air cleaner. These molecules continue to get smaller as air passes through the fibers that are integral to the system. Finally, the process of diffusion takes place, caused by the air colliding with other gas particles.

There are many uses for a HEPA air purifier system, the most important of which is the highly effective way it rids the air of allergens that we regularly breathe in. You can’t totally eliminate the contaminants in the air by using a HEPA air purifier, but you can definitely reduce them substantially.

So many of us these days are concerned with the purity of the air we breathe in. Even though we have all inhaled unpurified air for centuries, installing a home air purifier has suddenly become extremely popular, and also necessary as a result of the industrial revolution and modern technology.

The question remains, are air cleaners necessary, and are they truly effective?

Effectiveness of Air Cleaners

You really need to do your research on the various kinds of air cleaners and purifiers before you set out to buy one. If you are aware of the way in which they operate and how effective they are it will make the decision of which brand to buy so much easier.

If the air in your house is less than pure, it’s good to know that the air cleaner or purifier that you purchase will let you breathe fresh, clean air once more.

If you ask the questions and get the answers you need about whichever purification systems you are considering, all you then have to do is to choose one which meets your needs and falls within your budget.

There are many different varieties and styles of air cleaners and purifiers available today. The main type is the HEPA filter system. This popular model works by drawing air in through a filter and then blowing it back out into the room. It’s been shown to be a useful gadget that greatly improves the quality of the air we breathe.

Then there are ozone air purifiers which work in a different way by releasing ozone molecules into the air we inhale.

Other types of air cleaners and purifiers available include the ionic air purifier and others which feature electrostatic precipitators and filters. You can also find air filters which are compatible with the many models of air cleaners and purifiers and these can be used for numerous purposes.

Make sure you test the quantity of allergens within the air inside your home and then the decision of which air cleaner or purifier best suits your needs should not prove to be too difficult a task.