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Make Your Home More Cozy With This Modern Appliance

Your home is many things. For most people, their home is where they retreat after a long day’s work. Many homeowners look for a home that makes it easy to have wonderful memories and create good times. One way to make any home more appealing is to make it cozier. A cozier home is a home that helps the homeowner turn their precious home into a snug retreat from the cold weather. There are many elements that go into creating a cozier home. Two of the most important are heating and light. As the days grow shorter, the air grows cooler. People turn to their home to come in from the cold and find the light.

A Fireplace

One of the best ways to bring both light and warmth into any home is with a fireplace. Fireplaces have long been used to help heat homes. They are also treasured as a means of adding lovely flickering light in deep shades of yellow and orange. However, a traditional fireplace has many drawbacks. A standard fireplace can be messy, very hard to keep clean and even potentially dangerous. This is why many homeowners have found it best to look for alternatives. One increasingly popular possibility are electric fireplaces. Installing an electric fireplace has many advantages.

In Any Room

Unlike standard fireplaces, an electric fireplace can be used in any room in your home. An electric fireplace need not go in a designated space in the room that is only used for the fireplace. Many people do not have a chimney or have that one is blocked off by walls. In that case, they can use the electric fireplace in the room instead. An electric fireplace can be used in any room in the home. Better yet, the electric fireplace, unlike a standard fireplace, is completely portable. A homeowner can take it with them as they head from the living room to their bedroom.

Easy to Maintain

Another advantage of using an electric fireplace is that such fireplaces are easier to maintain. Maintaining a standard fireplace can be hard. The homeowner must first find and keep firewood on hand in order to create a fire. They also need to keep a supply of material to help start and maintain the fire once it starts. After the fire is done, the homeowner may need to sweep up layers of ash from the fireplace and even from the surrounding area. This is not true of an electric fireplace. The fireplace can be started with the the push of a button. Once the heat has begun, the homeowner can control it precisely, avoiding the possibility of too much heat. When the homeowner wants to stop the heat, no messy clean up and putting out the fire is required. Instead, they can simply shut it off.

Clean and Efficient

A standard fireplace may emit harmful chemicals. For example, the fireplace can emit too much carbon monoxide. This gas can pose serious, major health problems. By contrast, there are no such health problems with the use of an electric fireplace. No fumes are emitted when you turn it on. Just like with a standard fireplace, you get beautiful flames to admire in lovely colors. However, you need not worry that the flames will bring unwanted chemicals into your home. Even better, many such fireplace offer wonderful options including flickering embers and even the crackling noise a standard fireplace makes. Furthermore, this fireplace, unlike other standard fireplaces, has safety glass so the homeowner does not need to worry that a small child might get dangerous burns.

In short, an electric fireplace can be an ideal way to create a home that is both cozy and safe. Here are some useful sites for more information:

http://home.howstuffworks.com/home-improvement/heating-and-cooling/electric-fireplaces.htm/

www.bestelectricfireplace.review/

doityourself.com/stry/electric-vs-gas-vs-wood-fireplaces-the-heat-is-on/

Tips for Making your Next Scarecrow

Farmers place scarecrows in open fields to discourage birds from feeding on growing plants and recently-cast seeds. These structures are used across the world in rice, maize, wheat, and many other farms. You can also build a scarecrow to decorate your yard. Below are helpful steps you can use to make a perfect scarecrow that will decorate and secure your garden against birds, sparrows, and crows.

Gather Supplies

First, you need to gather materials to construct the scarecrow. They include the following:

Nails
Old clothes
Long wooden boards
Straw
Old hat
Strings

Build the Frame

You should use two nails when building the frame of the scarecrow. You should place them slightly apart to prevent the cross frame from spinning. Finally, you should select a position near vulnerable plants and knock the frame into the ground using a hammer.

Put the Shirt On

You should use an old shirt to dress the scarecrow. The horizontal stick should be the arms of the structure. Use a string to tie around the bottom of the shirt tightly to give the structure a waistline. Also, tie off the sleeves of the shirt.

Stuff the Structure

The best stuffing material is straw. It is environmentally friendly. Additionally, when you use straw as the stuffing material, the shape of the scarecrow will not change during rainy seasons. You can also use the material to give the structure a potbelly.

Add Gloves

You can use gardening gloves to give the structure a realistic human form. However, you should stuff the gloves perfectly to keep them firm and in proper shape. It is advisable to tuck in the shirt sleeves’ ends inside the gloves.

Attach Stuffed Pants

First, you should stuff pants using straw to give them a realistic shape. Measure the height of the structure before stuffing the pants to align them. Attach the pants to the structure using suspenders. On either side, tie the suspenders through the belt loops. Tying a string around the frame and through the back belt loop will secure and make them stable. Ensure the pants are tightly tied at the bottom using a strong string, which keeps the stuffing material intact.

Add Shoes

An old pair of shoes or boots will finish off the lower part of the structure. Tie the boots onto the base of the pants to ensure that they are stable.

Make the Head

You can use a burlap sack, usually used to carry coffee beans or to protect trees, to make a perfect scarecrow head. If you do not have a burlap sack, you can use a pillowcase to make the head. The process of making a scarecrow head using a pillowcase involves:

Fill the pillowcase halfway with the stuffing material of your choice, preferably straw.
Use safety pins to pin the pillowcase, which prevents the stuffing material from falling out.
Leave an opening at the bottom of the pillowcase.
The next step includes inserting the stuffed pillowcase onto the vertical pole.
Tie the bottom of the pillowcase to the pole to make a perfect scarecrow head.

Give the Structure a Personality by Adding Facial Features

You should decorate the face of the structure. You can put straw hair beneath an old hat. Lastly, you can use colored buttons for the mouth, nose, and eyes.
Conclusively, you can accessorize the scarecrow by tying a red bandana around its neck and leaving a colored handkerchief peeking out of the structure’s pocket.

How to Properly Handle Your Fall Harvest

There’s no denying it – fall is right at our heels. There can be a lot to take care of this time of year, and if you’ve been lucky quite a bit of it will have to do with harvesting and storing your garden’s bountiful rewards. Here are some tips for some common vegetables:

Onions and other Alliums

Onions and alliums are a desert-island staple among many of the world’s top chefs. As summer comes to a close, you’ll start to notice your onion greens folding and hanging over. This means it’s time to harvest, and they can be gentled pulled by the greens to remove them from the soil. Pungent onions should be cured prior to storage, which is achieved by giving them plenty of space in a dry environment for up to a month. Store your alliums in a dark and cool place. Mild onions tend to spoil more quickly (often less than a month), but you’ll be delighted to hear that the more pungent counterparts can keep sometimes up to a year!

Winter Squashes

Winter squash can take quite some time to ripen, but once they do they’ll be full of flavor and can be stored for the long haul – if cared for properly. Once the vines die back and the squash has developed a hard skin, they should be ready for harvest. Make sure to take them in before frost or will ruin the flesh! Store your winter squash on a drying rack in a cool, dry place and they should be usable for several months.

Herbs

The summer months are full of flavor with herbs growing at their fullest, but you can enjoy them throughout the year by drying or freezing. If you choose to dry the plants, pull up the whole plant by the root and hang upside down until the leaves have become brittle and paper-like. Then remove the leaves and collect in a jar for use throughout the year. Alternatively, freezing your herbs can retain more flavor, but this is really better suited for cooking use. Wash, trim, and dry your herbs thoroughly before freezing for best results.

Potatoes and Tubers

Nothing says fall like a pan of roasted potatoes. When your potatoe greens begin to die away and turn brown it’s time to dig up the gold. Nothing too fancy here! Just be careful not to damage the skin or the flesh, as this will obviously reduce shelf life. Cure your potatoes for a few weeks prior to storage by spreading them out in a dry environment. Store them in a cool and dry place without cleaning and you’ll be stocked up for the winter.

Artichokes

Artichokes are the classic Western American vegetable – and truly a delicacy if prepared well. They are ready to harvest once the leaves are just beginning to spread, and should be cut such that a generous amount of stem remains. Unfortunately they don’t have the longest shelf life, so keep them cool and make sure to use them quickly so they don’t go to waste!

Coming soon!

The cafe is on it’s way!

If you’re looking for a place where you can come and learn the concepts of Western American cooking and lifestyle, you needn’t look any further. The Wild Horse Cafe will be your all-in-one stop for recipes, home design tips, news, and so much more!

Maybe you’d like to try something new in the kitchen, and classic home style comfort food is just the thing to hit the spot? Or maybe you’re wondering about the latest in fall fashion, and how you can best match an outfit to your brand new flannel? Or just maybe you’re wondering how to set up your garden to grow the most vegetables to keep your family fed throughout the year.

Whatever the case, rest assured that we’ll have you covered. It will take some time, but we’ll make sure to bring you the information you need as soon as we can. Stop in any time and join in the fun with some like-minded folks. We look forward to seeing you soon!