Category: Home Improvement

  • Windows and doors – a cautionary tale

    One of the major things we wanted to do to the house when we bought it was to replace all the old windows/doors. Getting this done turned into quite a saga.If you live in Royston, I’d strongly advise against using Manor Windows.

  • Considerations in complete kitchen replacement

    Considerations in complete kitchen replacement

    In the last week I have completed removal of the old kitchen, so I now have a large empty room, and it is time to start putting things back together. 

  • DIY skills – level up – Removing a wall

    Last weekend I levelled up my DIY ability.I’ve done a fair number of DIY tasks over the years, from the relatively mundane painting walls up to things a little more interesting such as building decking, and even once I built a raised pond, which involved digging foundations, pouring concrete and brick laying. However, last weekend…

  • One Hour With: Raspberry Pi NOIR Camera

    Over the Christmas period I had a chunk of time off, and so of course I filled it with many more things I’d like to do than I really had the time or energy for. One of these was to play with one of my Christmas gifts, a NoIR camera for my Raspberry Pi.

  • Wood burning stove

    Over the last several weeks we have been completely redecorating our living room. I’ll post more about that later. The centre piece of this refurbished room is a nice new wood burning stove.

  • The Maker’s Den – Converting a box room into a home office/electronics workbench

     Having turned one of our rooms into a study for my wife, the box room is mine. You might suggest that it is a little extravagant to have a study each, but my wife’s study is a very personal space for her, and whilst she lets me use it to work from home, she does…

  • Custom shelving

    The truth is that a study is incomplete until a copious amount of books can be unpacked onto shelves. In our rented house we had a few standalone bookshelves, but what is the point of owning a house if you don’t put up wall hung shelves? 

  • Redecorating the study

    Having recently moved, I’m back to the wonderful world of having lots of DIY to be getting on with. So much that is is hard to chose where to start!

  • New House – new workshop

    I’ve been a little quiet on the blog for a little while, because we’ve been in the process of moving house. Lots of packing and worrying about logistics etc. Of course the biggest question mark was the moving of the workshop!

  • HomeHack: fixing a leaking toilet cistern

    My toilet had started to have a perpetual leak of water from the cistern into the bowl. The valve on the water inlet was no longer sealing off properly.