How do I start researching/selecting cabinets?
K D
9 years ago
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9 years agoAltare Design, LLC
9 years agoRelated Discussions
How do I get started?
Comments (4)Organic is Totally within your reach, it's actually easier than the other kinds cause your basically letting nature do the work. Your job is to create ballance, this starts with good soil (lots of organic material (OM) mixed in). Good soil pretty much takes care of needing fertilizers but you can buy mixed organic fertilizers and it's harder to mess up with organics and burn your plants as it is with chemical fertilizers. For bugs you use more gentle techniques, you encourage the 'good bugs' which eat the 'bad bugs' and if something gets out of wack, you ask and someone will know how to fix it, besides you would have to learn which chemicals and they are really terrible for the soil, the beneficial organisms and bugs, and you. I just started my first garden since I was a child. I had been doing container gardening but in the ground is different. First what do you wanna grow? I'll assume vegies and I'll suggest what I'm doing-cause that's what I know. I'm doing 'square foot gardening' this is simply intensive gardening, you grow stuff in beds instead of in rows, you grow things close together and all mixed up. I think all the info you need on 'square foot gardening (SFG)' you can find on the '(SFG) forum' so check out their facs and they are really nice so ask questions. The author of SFG suggests you start with 1 4x4 block for each person you want to feed-for salad vegies you need more space for bigger gardens. I have the book and it is informative but most of the info is online-but you might check it out from the library. It is a good book. I have several gardening books (too many-though not the southern gardening one) and by far the best in my opinion is The Vegetable Gardener's Bible: Discover Ed's High-Yield W-O-R-D System for All North American Gardening Regions. He also does bed gardening but doesn't section the space like square foot gardening does and he is organic. The other technique you might consider is lasagna gardening, the soil forum knows all about this technique of layering compostables and mulches to create a raised bed that composts over time (also called sheet composting) and I think the soil forum Fac covers this-they are nice too so ask them too. I'm laying a lasagna bed right now-cause I can't face digging another garden in Tx clay gumbo. Fall is a perfect time to do a lasagna garden cause it can mellow and compost all winter to be ready for spring planting-though you can plant right away. Things that are easy to grow: Radishes, Carrots, Bush Beans (green beans), swiss chard, arugula seems easy, zucchinni grows like mad but takes tons of space. Oh do some herbs, like basil, oregano, mint (can be invasive), dill, cilantro many herbs are easier and they tend to protect plants against some of the pests and their flowers attract beneficial insects. With all respect to organica's excellent advice, I would hold off on the compost pile, I'm starting one now but as a beginner you just need to buy compost at lowes or someplace and incorporate in your soil to get started. I find composting sorta intimidating-though I'm getting over it and its a really great thing to do, I just think it's too much all at once for a beginner. Don't stress about it, its for enjoyment. I have to remember that sometimes :) Have fun, Kristi...See MoreHelp PLEASE! I started lasagna, do I need to start over?
Comments (6)Not to worry Mari. As others have said tilling is not necessarily needed. My tiller was never effective in this rocky, hard clay and usually just bounced all over creation so I stopped trying. I've been doing exactly what you did for the last two years with great results. I'm slowly reclaiming what I thought were impossible areas just by putting down a couple of layers of cardboard right overtop of thriving weeds and making sure it overlaps properly to prevent sunlight from penetrating. Then I cover that with a thick layer of mulch/dirt, etc... (heck, sometimes I don't even mulch if it's an area that isn't easily visible and won't be an eyesore. If there are already established plants in the area I just cardboard around them and pull whatever weeds may reach out around their bases. Otherwise I just wait until the weeds are dead before planting new things. Even if a few stray weeds or runners find a way through it's much easier to eliminate those few once all the rest are dead. I had an area that was completely taken over by wild blackberry vines taller than me. They spread 15 feet closer to the house in just one season! So I whacked everything to the ground and then blanketed with the cardboard in the summer and everything underneath is dead now(yay!) I have yet to find a chemical brush or weed killer that actually does what it's supposed to and kill the root of the annoying weed grasses, thorny vines, etc... This takes a little longer but will not waste your money or time like spraying. I also just borrowed a large rubber liner from a relative and I'm going to use that to try and retake my gravel driveway and parking area one section at a time. I have heard this "solarization" is not always recommended for areas where you intend to plant though because the heat will also kill the beneficial microbes & organisms that are in that soil. Weeds in gravel are an awful pain. I look forward to a day when we can afford to blacktop it. Sincerely, Danielle...See MoreHow to find and select a Kitchen Designer or how to start at all?
Comments (8)The first place I'd start is the original retailer of your cabinets. If you are planning on reusing the majority f your cabinets, you will only be able to do so if you can order other pieces that will match what you've got. This also gives your design an inflexibility that most designers won't want to work with. It's common for homeowners to have one or two special pieces that a kitchen is designed around, but a whole kitchen's worth of cabinets is something else entirely. It's VERY VERY challenging to take cabinets designed to fit in one space and then change the layout and still manage to use even half of what you've got. Several folks on here have bought second hand cabinets or cabinets at an outlet store and managed to create some very special kitchens while being imlprisoned to those specific cabinets, but most were able to order a couple of fill in pieces from the original manufacturer. They also did their own designing for the most part. Most designer wouldn't work under such limitations, as Palimpset states, they make money from the sale of the cabinets. An independent designer is great for overall space planning, but unless they intimately know the spec book of the cabinet brand involved, any designs that they do may not translate to the cabinet brand that you use. Kitchen designs work within a certain framework of available sizes and options, and you can't assume those sizes and options are available in every brand. I'll echo posting your current layout of the space only---and don't list the current cabinets. Let the folks here work free of that constraints to find the most optimum layout for you. Then, after you've got that down pat, you can work to see if you actually can plug any of the cabinets into the design. Otherwise, you're most likely NOT going to end up with something significantly different than what you have....See MoreHow much time do you spend researching your projects?
Comments (5)Oh, I think you'll find that most of the folks here and on some of the other forums herein like Decorating, Bathroom, yada yada, are incessant researchers as well. I think that trait is what draws us here in the first place. I don't know if budget issues increases that time commitment. I've definitely seen people buying fridges that cost more than my entire remodel doing hours of due diligence as well. Sure, we get a few folks who post and run and just want some hand-holding and then we don't see them here again. That's fine. That's what we're here for. Of course, they could be doing hours of research other places as well so that' not a sure-fire way of knowing just how much time they put in. I have analysis paralysis in most areas of my life. Changing eating habits, researching gear for hiking/biking, trails and bike routes, exercise routines, how to pack light when traveling, planning a vacation, gardening, etc. Sometimes I have to force myself to just pull the trigger and do it, whatever it is, instead of just reading about it. :)...See Moresjhockeyfan325
9 years agoSharonNM
9 years agoFori
9 years agoStarCraft Custom Builders
9 years agoAltare Design, LLC
9 years agolast modified: 9 years agoStarCraft Custom Builders
9 years agoathomesewing
9 years agohappyallison
9 years ago
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