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	<title>Home Improvements Depot &#187; Do-It-Yourself Mistakes</title>
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	<description>Home Improvement Tips and Tricks for the Average Homeowner!</description>
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		<title>Surprises In The Walls After Removing Wallpaper</title>
		<link>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/surprises-from-removing-wallpaper/</link>
		<comments>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/surprises-from-removing-wallpaper/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Fri, 25 Mar 2011 10:19:09 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Tom Coffee</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Do-It-Yourself Mistakes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Home Improvement Humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Interior Projects]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[paint]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/?p=1137</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[When I wrote about removing wallpaper in my small second bathroom I alluded to the fact that you be in for some surprises under your wallpaper as your tear it down. I mentioned this because I actually found a few different things in the tiny room that were surprising, interesting and just plain weird. Here they are: Surprise #1: Behind the large plate mirror in the bathroom there was actually once a medicine cabinet&#8230; with the gaping hole to prove it. On the wall there was the message &#8220;Hello George and Barbara 6/97&#8243;. We didn&#8217;t know of a George and Barbara living in the home at this time, so either George and Barbara did the work or they were past owners of the home at some point that we didn&#8217;t know about. This hole technically wasn&#8217;t being hidden by wallpaper, but since I had to remove the wallpaper that was under the large mirror it meant that I had to take the mirror down. The 4&#8242; x 3&#8242; mirror weighed about 20 pounds and was being held on the wall by three old mirror brackets that were screwed in to the drywall. There were no anchors and they were not [...]]]></description>
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		<title>The Case of the Mysterious Basement Leak</title>
		<link>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/the-case-of-the-mysterious-basement-leak/</link>
		<comments>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/the-case-of-the-mysterious-basement-leak/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Mon, 05 Apr 2010 10:50:02 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Tom Coffee</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Basement Remodeling]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[DIY Plumbing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Do-It-Yourself Mistakes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[basement]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/?p=772</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[It was while I was in the middle of framing and insulating my basement that I first found the mysterious leak in my basement. One sunny day I was happily putting up steel framing and when I returned the next rainy day I found a pie-plate sized puddle forming right where the basement foundation and cinder block walls met. My basement has always been bone dry until I found this leak, which suddenly had me wondering if I should even bother to refinish my basement because anything I did down there might be subject to flooding or water damage. This had been a particularly wet season with a lot of melting snow followed by a lot of rain, so I wasn&#8217;t sure if it was just something I had never experienced or if this was a genuinely new problem that wasn&#8217;t there before. Before I became too worked up I decided to see if I could simply figure out what was going on. I lined up my suspects and methodically examined each one. Suspect#1 &#8211; A Leak In The Basement Foundation: I didn&#8217;t actually see any sort of a crack or split between the wall and floor but we had [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
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		<title>What Is Air Duct Cleaning and Is It Worth It?</title>
		<link>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/an-air-duct-cleaning-review/</link>
		<comments>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/an-air-duct-cleaning-review/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Sun, 17 May 2009 10:49:53 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Tom Coffee</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Basement Remodeling]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Do-It-Yourself Mistakes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[New Home Products]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[hvac]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/?p=290</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[About this time every year my mailbox starts filling up with ads for air duct cleaning services that come into your home and actually vacuum out all the accumulated dust and debris (and even mold) that builds up the metal ducts of any sort of forced air heating or air conditioner system. These companies usually pull up to your house in vans that have tremendous vacuum cleaning units in them. I&#8217;ve watched them as they run large hoses (more like giant tubes) into a home and basically suck out all the dust and debris from the vents of a home. Some actually scrub the insides of the ducts, but mold isn&#8217;t a big problem in my part of the country, so most of the ones around me seem to offer just the vacuuming service. I didn&#8217;t want to have my home&#8217;s air ducts cleaned but my wife saw a coupon in one of our local papers that advertised a &#8220;$39.95&#8243; special that included a cleaning of 10 vents and 1 intake trunk of a forced air heating or AC system. I was skeptical, but our house is over 50 years old and the vents had never been properly vacuumed out [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>17</slash:comments>
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		<title>How Not To Install A Set of Stairs</title>
		<link>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/how-not-to-install-a-set-of-stairs/</link>
		<comments>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/how-not-to-install-a-set-of-stairs/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 25 Oct 2007 11:03:00 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Tom Coffee</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[Do-It-Yourself Mistakes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Home Improvement Humor]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[diy]]></category>

		<guid isPermaLink="false">http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/how-not-to-install-a-set-of-stairs/</guid>
		<description><![CDATA[This is about my recent adventure in putting together a set of outside stairs on the side of my house. This is not a how-to article, but rather, an article about what not to do. This is an embarrassing do-it-yourself mistake. We had a new sliding glass door put into our house a few weeks ago, but we haven&#8217;t been able to use it because the door is three feet off the ground and exits out over a flowerbed. Instead of continually walking outside and plunging into the petunias I decided to save some money and build a set of stairs myself. Things don&#8217;t always work out as you plan them. Now, I have to say this: I&#8217;ve used stairs all my life. I know how stairs work. You walk up, you walk down. I figured they can&#8217;t be all that hard to build. The first thing I do, of course, is go to Home Depot to see if can just buy a set of stairs and nail it to the side of my house and claim the structure as my own. In any other country this would be a ridiculous idea, but this is America and here in America [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>7</slash:comments>
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		<title>Learn From My Plumbing Mistake: Don&#8217;t Pay $133.75 For A Tiny Rubber Washer</title>
		<link>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/im-glad-i-paid-13375-for-a-tiny-rubber-washer/</link>
		<comments>http://www.homeimprovementsdepot.com/im-glad-i-paid-13375-for-a-tiny-rubber-washer/#comments</comments>
		<pubDate>Thu, 09 Aug 2007 10:09:41 +0000</pubDate>
		<dc:creator>Tom Coffee</dc:creator>
				<category><![CDATA[DIY Plumbing]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[Do-It-Yourself Mistakes]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[bathroom]]></category>
		<category><![CDATA[plumbing]]></category>

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		<description><![CDATA[Last night we ran a bath for our son and when I turned off the hot water a strange thing happened: the hot water did not turn off. I twisted and pushed and turned, but no matter what I did with the 40 year old shower faucet, the hot water kept running out as though I wasn&#8217;t even there. I sighed and then ran down to the basement and turned off the hot water for the shower. Once my son was in bed I started working on the faucet. Most faucets leak because of worn out washers, so you generally just have to replace the washer to stop the leak. I had to take off the hot water knob, unscrew the valve stem and check the washer on the inside to see if it had to be replaced or not. It looked straightforward enough, so I grabbed a few tools and gave it a shot. I removed the screw in the center of the knob and tried to tug it off. It didn&#8217;t budge. I pulled some more. Nothing moved. I grabbed the knob with both hands and pulled, but this time I noticed that the pipes inside the wall [...]]]></description>
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		<slash:comments>2</slash:comments>
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