How To Prepare For A New Year’s Eve Party

If you're doing the honors this season, you can start the New Year off with a party that will be as memorable as it is free of annoying hiccups and problems.

The Planning

Whether it's a New Year's party, a graduation party or a birthday, great parties are the result of good planning:

• Guest list - Invite guests well in advance. Friends and family plan their holiday outings way ahead of time, so give your guests six to eight weeks' notice. Provide an RSVP deadline, but don't rely on hearing back from everyone. Wait a couple of weeks and send follow up emails or call people you haven't heard from. Once you do have a preliminary list of attendees, there are bound to be some changes before the big night. Accept cancellations, additions and no shows with good grace.
• Invitation strategy - When you put together an invitation, you have some options. You can send your invitation electronically or through the mail. Snail mail invites set a more formal tone, but they are also more expensive and time consuming. The formality of the party and average age of your guests may be the best determiner of how to draft the invitation.
• The details - Having a good plan for the party before you send out invitations is a great idea. If you can outline the party's approximate time and duration, whether or not guests are expected to bring their own alcoholic beverages and other particulars, it will save you having to relay information to each guest individually. It's also a good idea to provide directions to the location with a map and some suggestions for parking.  

The more you can relay now, the less confusion there will be later in the planning process. One of the really nice things about doing the majority of the planning before you send out the invites is that it forces you to take a practical approach using specifics like how many people you can comfortably entertain, how elaborate you want the food options to be, whether or not there will be children in attendance and other important considerations.

The Layout

The furniture in your home may be arranged perfectly to accommodate your family and a couple of guests. When you're entertaining a crowd, though, some modifications may be in order:

• Make way - To open up the space and make it mingle friendly, anticipate the way traffic will flow from the entrance of your home to the food and drink areas, the bathrooms, the coatroom and back to the entry. Now clear as much space as you can to accommodate and encourage that traffic flow pattern.

• Protect your breakables - No one expects to have an accident while visiting a friend's home, but mishaps do happen. To avoid ending your party on a sour note, stow your treasured breakables in a safe location for the evening. If Aunt Edna's vase is irreplaceable, make sure it doesn't fall prey to a tipsy reveler by putting it away.
• Designate a coatroom - In cold climates, guests start shedding outerwear as soon as they arrive. Make sure you have an accessible spot prepared to receive coats, hostess gifts and purses for the duration of the party. Keeping everything together will make it easier for your guests to take their leave gracefully at the end of the evening, too.
• Keep them moving - Although you may be serving food, keeping the portions small and easy to eat will allow guests to move around while they're nibbling. This has a couple of good benefits to the host: It encourages conversation and eliminates the need for concurrent seating for everyone. This doesn't mean you shouldn't employ more seating than your home usually contains. Extra chairs and a folding table or two are always a good idea. When you make sitting down an option rather than a necessity, though, you keep the party lively.

The Details

In the end, you can strategize a perfect party and have it fall apart because you neglected a few important details:

• Music - The music often sets the tone for the celebration. You know the style of your party and the likely makeup of your guest list. Now is the time to choose the perfect music to get people in a party mood. Hearing is one of the most evocative senses, so don't miss this opportunity to make the most of your musical selections. If this is way out of your comfort zone, there are many themed music CDs based on specific artists, decades and musical styles that can help.
• Join in - As the host, it's easy to become so engrossed in the details that you forget to enjoy the celebration. Get out of the kitchen (or from behind the bar) and mingle. At midnight, everyone will be directing a grateful glance your way. Don't miss it.
• Find the fun - Parties are a little like big weather events. You can plan for them, but your predictions are almost never completely accurate. Some parties fall flat and others are simply magic. As you navigate your party, look for magical moments and try to bring others in on a joke or reminiscence. It's one way to create party momentum without working at it too hard.
• Winding down - If you've established a timeline for the party in the invitation, your guests will know when it's time to leave. If there are some stragglers, you can give them polite encouragement by turning down the music or turning up the lights. Before people start reaching for their car keys, though, locate alternative transportation for anyone who may have indulged in a little too much holiday cheer.

Source: Sara Elliot, idealhomegarden.com

Tax credit and deduction tips for home improvement in 2012

(ARA) - With the new year under way, you may be thinking about needed home improvements and how you'll use your credit to fund them. While it's important to understand your credit before making major home improvement decisions, you should also consider another kind of credit - tax credits for energy efficient home improvements.

For the past few years, the federal government has offered tax credits for certain home improvements aimed at increasing a home's energy efficiency. While the most popular and generous tax credits, such as the one that allowed you to claim up to 30 percent of improvements such as a new roof or hot water heater, have expired, you can still get credit for other significant energy-efficient improvements.

According to EnergyStar.gov, you can claim a tax credit for 30 percent of the cost of installing a geothermal heat pump, small wind turbine or solar energy system in your home. The credit has no upper limit and applies to both existing homes and new construction, but not to rental properties. This credit is good until Dec. 31, 2016.

You can also get a credit of up to 30 percent of the cost of residential fuel cells, up to $500 per .5kW of power capacity, EnergyStar.gov says. This credit is also available until Dec. 31, 2016.

While the initial cost of these improvements may seem significant, they can dramatically decrease home energy bills in the long run.

Depending on the type of home improvement or repair you undertake, you may also be able to claim a deduction on your taxes. Before launching a significant home repair or improvement, it may pay to consult with your tax accountant to see what, if any, portion of the cost may be deductible. And, as you do home repairs throughout the year, keep receipts and discuss the improvements and possible deductions with your accountant when he or she is preparing your tax return.

Knowing ahead of time which, if any, tax credits or deductions your home improvement may qualify for can help you make a better decision about how to use credit to fund the work. Since how you use credit affects your overall credit score, knowing the cost of a project before starting it can help you better manage your credit.

If you're unsure how a home improvement project may affect your credit score, websites like freecreditscore.com can help you understand your credit. The site offers members a Credit Score Estimator that can help you understand how big financial decisions, like applying for a home improvement loan, may affect your credit score.

To learn more about tax credits for energy efficient home improvements, visit http://www.energystar.gov/.

To learn more about tax deductions, visit www.IRS.gov. You can find a list of regional tax credits, rebates and savings at energy.gov/savings.

Holiday Checklist

Getting organized is the best way to ensure you’ll have more holiday cheer, less holiday stress.  Since we are only three days away from Christmas 2012, we wanted to share a few tips with you to help in your last minute holiday preparation:

Three Days Before

• Shop for fresh ingredients. Hit the store for the last-minute vegetables or fruit you need for meals.
• Set the table. So you use those gold-rimmed goblets only once a year? Enjoy them! Go ahead and set the table. Make it even easier on the big day by putting a sticky note on each platter that states what dish you plan to serve on it. (That also allows people to help you without asking 12 times.)

Two Days Before

• Start cooking. You’ve probably socked away some things in the freezer already, but now’s the time to prep main courses and make anything that can sit for a couple of days.
• Buy fresh flowers. Whether they are for a party or a family meal, fresh flowers should always be purchased two days in advance. Blooms have time to open up, and they’ll still be lush and fragrant.

The Day Before

• Recharge the batteries on your camera or video recorder. You don’t want to miss the reaction on a little one’s face because the battery ran out during the school pageant the week before.
• Finish last-minute wrapping. And assemble toys that will be surprises from Santa.
• Finish cooking, and make a timeline for the next day. Decide when you’ll be feasting, then count backward to determine when to put the turkey (or ham or roast beef) in the oven and what else needs to be cooked.
• Sit back and relax. Enjoy your family and friends and relish the traditions you share.

Source:  RealSimple.com

Fireplace Maintenance

As you snuggle in front of a cozy fire or bask in the warmth of your wood stove, you are taking part in a ritual of comfort and enjoyment handed down through the centuries. The last thing you are likely to be thinking about is the condition of your chimney. However, if you don't give some thought to it before you light those winter fires, your enjoyment may be very short-lived. Why? Dirty chimneys can cause chimney fires, which damage structures, destroy homes and injure or kill people.

Chimney fires can burn explosively -- noisy and dramatic enough to be detected by neighbors or passersby. Flames or dense smoke may shoot from the top of the chimney. Homeowners report being startled by a low rumbling sound that reminds them of a freight train or a low flying air plane. However, those are only the chimney fires you know about. Slow-burning chimney fires don't get enough air or have enough fuel to be as dramatic or visible. But, the temperatures they reach are very high and can cause as much damage to the chimney structure - and nearby combustible parts of the house - as their more spectacular cousins. With proper chimney system care, chimneyfires are entirely preventable.

Creosote and Chimney Fires
Fireplaces and wood stoves are designed to safely contain wood-fueled fires, while providing heat for a home. The chimneys that serve them have the job of expelling the by-products of combustion -- the substances given off when wood burns.

As these substances exit the fireplace or wood stove, and flow up into the relatively cooler chimney, condensation occurs. The resulting residue that sticks to the inner walls of the chimney is called creosote. Creosote is black or brown in appearance. It can be crusty and flaky ... tar-like, drippy and sticky ... or shiny and hardened. Often, all forms will occur in one chimney system.

Whatever form it takes, creosote is highly combustible. If it builds up in sufficient quantities -- and catches fire inside the chimney flue -- the result will be a chimney fire. Although any amount of creosote can burn, sweeps are concerned when creosote builds up in sufficient quantities to sustain a long, hot, destructive chimney fire.

Certain conditions encourage the buildup of creosote, restricted air supply, unseasoned wood and cooler-than-normal chimney temperatures are all factors that can accelerate the buildup of creosote on chimney flue walls.

Air supply: The air supply on fireplaces may be restricted by closed glass doors or by failure to open the damper wide enough to move heated smoke up the chimney rapidly (the longer the smoke's "residence time" in the flue, the more likely is it that creosote will form). A wood stove's air supply can be limited by closing down the stove damper or air inlets too soon and too much, and by improperly using the stovepipe damper to restrict air movement.

Burning unseasoned firewood: Because so much energy is used initially just to drive off the water trapped in the cells of the logs - burning green wood keeps the resulting smoke cooler, as it moves through the system, than if dried, seasoned wood is used.

Cool flue temperatures: In the case of wood stoves, fully-packed loads of wood (that give large cool fires and eight or 10 hour burn times) contribute to creosote buildup. Condensation of the unburned by-products of combustion also occurs more rapidly in an exterior chimney, for example, than in a chimney that runs through the center of a house and exposes only the upper reaches of the flue to the elements.

How Chimney Fires Damage Chimneys

Masonry chimneys: When chimney fires occur in masonry chimneys - whether the flues are an older, unlined type or are tile lined to meet current safety codes - the high temperatures at which they burn (around 2000' F) can "melt" mortar, crack tiles, cause liners to collapse and damage the outer masonry material. Most often, tiles crack and mortar is displaced, which provides a pathway for flames to reach the combustible wood frame of the house. One chimney fire may not harm a home. A second can burn it down. Enough heat can also conduct through a perfectly sound chimney to ignite nearby combustibles.

Pre-fabricated, factory-built, metal chimneys: To be installed in most jurisdictions in the United States, factory-built, metal chimneys that are designed to vent wood burning stoves or pre- fabricated metal fireplaces must pass special tests determined by Underwriter's Laboratories (U.L.). Under chimney fire conditions, damage to these systems still may occur, usually in the form of buckled or warped seams and joints on the inner liner. When pre-fabricated, factory-built metal chimneys are damaged by a chimney fire, they should no longer be used and must be replaced.

Ways to Avoid Chimney Fires
Chimney fires don't have to happen. Here are some ways to avoid them:

• Use seasoned woods only (dryness is more important than hard wood versus soft wood considerations)
• Build smaller, hotter fires that burn more completely and produce less smoke
• Never burn cardboard boxes, wrapping paper, trash or Christmas trees; these can spark a chimneyfire
• Install stovepipe thermometers to help monitor flue temperatures where wood stoves are in use, so you can adjust burning practices as needed
• Have the chimney inspected and cleaned on a regular basis

Proper Maintenance
Clean chimneys don't catch fire. Have your solid fuel venting system inspected annually, and have it cleaned and repaired whenever needed.

Your chimney sweep may have other maintenance recommendations depending on how you use your fireplace or stove.

The Chimney Safety Institute of America recommends that you call on certified chimney sweeps, since they are regularly tested on their understanding of the complexities of chimney and venting systems.

Signs That You've Had a Chimney Fire
Since chimney fires can occur without anyone being aware of them ... and since damage from such fires can endanger a home and its occupants, how do you tell if you've experienced a chimney fire?

Here are the signs a professional chimney sweep looks for:

• "puffy" creosote, with rainbow colored streaks, that has expanded beyond creosote's normal form
• warped metal of the damper, metal smoke chamber, connector pipe or factory-built metal chimney
• cracked or collapsed flue tiles, or tiles with large chunks missing
• discolored and distorted rain cap
• creosote flakes and pieces found on the roof or ground
• roofing material damaged from hot creosote
• cracks in exterior masonry
• evidence of smoke escaping through mortar joints of masonry or tile liners

If you think a chimney fire has occurred, call get a professional evaluation. If your suspicions are confirmed, a certified sweep will be able to make recommendations about how to bring the system back into compliance with safety standards. Depending on the situation, you might need a few flue tiles replaced, a relining system installed or an entire chimney rebuilt. Each situation is unique and will dictate its own solution.

What to Do if You Have a Chimney Fire

If you realize a chimney fire is occurring, follow these steps:

1) Get everyone out of the house, including yourself
2) Call the fire department
If you can do so without risk to yourself, these additional steps may help save your home. Remember,however, that homes are replaceable; lives are not:
1. Put a chimney fire extinguisher into the fireplace or wood stove
2. Close the glass doors on the fireplace
3. Close the air inlets on the wood stove
4. Use a garden hose to spray down the roof (not the chimney) so the fire won't spread to the rest of the structure
5. Monitor the exterior chimney temperature throughout the house for at least 2 or 3 hours after the fire is out

Once it's over, have the chimney inspected for damage. Chimney fire damage and repair normally is covered by homeowner insurance policies.

Source: Weather.com and The Chimney Safety Institute of America. You can find information about CSIA-certified chimney sweeps online.

New Year's Resolutions - Resolve to be Different!

Do the New Year's resolutions you make really reflect your personal goals?  Or are you just making the same resolutions as every other 47-year-old college grad in your tax bracket?

A study by the Barna Group says that certain demographics are more likely to make certain resolutions. 

Here were the most common resolutions people made for 2011 and the types of people who tended to make them:

1. Lose Weight/Get Fit: 30% - Women, Baby Boomers, Earners over $75K
2. Pay Off Debt/Earn More: 15% - Divorced Adults, Gen X, Gen Y, Earners under $20K
3. Improve Relationships:  13% - College Grads, Earners over $75K
4. Overcome Addiction:  12% - Men, Singles, Gen Y
5. Meet Career Goals:  5% - Singles, Gen Y, Midwest Residents, Earners Under $20K
6. Enhance Spirituality:  5% - Divorced Adults
7. Futher Education:  4% - Singles, Gen Y, Northeast Residents

So are you making the same resolutions as others like you?  If you are, that's not necessarily a bad thing.  What's important is making resolutions you can stick to. 

The study also found that 61 percent of Americans have made New Year's resolutions in the past.  Of those, about one in four say they experienced significant, long-term change as a result.  But half saw no change at all.

To give yours staying power over the long haul, be specific, write them down and try to build in a way to measure progress - with weekly check-ins, time requirements, etc.  By February, you could be feeling results instead of regrets.

Source:  Amy Anderson, Success magazine, January 2012 issue

Simplify and Organize: The Hottest Trends in Home Improvement

(ARA) - With the economy remaining uncertain, homeowners are tending to stay in place and upgrade their homes, rather than move up to something newer or larger. Just as economic conditions evolve, however, so does this housing trend. Simplifying and gaining control are now the hot incarnations of the "staying put" trend.


Organizational design expert, TV and radio personality, and author of numerous New York Times bestsellers, Peter Walsh hosts "Extreme Clutter" on the Oprah Winfrey Network and has starred on TLC's "Clean Sweep." Walsh offers some advice on how do-it-yourselfers can simplify home improvement, and gain control of their home environment, room by room:



Coping in the kitchen

The kitchen is the heart of the home, where you spend time as a family, prepare meals and entertain guests. All that activity and use can make it difficult to stay organized in the kitchen, but doing so can save you time and money.

* Maximize cupboard space with easy-to-install sliding racks. These racks make it easy and fast to find items, even in the deepest cupboards.

* Keep cooking utensils and flatware neat and easily accessible with a compartmentalized drawer organizer. You can find them in kitchen and home design stores.

* If you store often-used spices in a cupboard, it's easy to lose track of what's in there. You don't have to give up your cabinet convenience. Just put your most-used spices in a small baking sheet (you can even buy a disposable one) so that when you need something, you can slide the sheet out to make finding it easier.

* Retire your junk drawer - we all have one. It's the drawer where you deposit receipts, warranties, product manuals and other items. One way to clean up the paper portion of the mess is with an online organizational tool like MyLowe's on Lowes.com. The free online tool from home improvement retailer Lowe's allows you to keep track of purchases, warranties and manuals.

"I'm always trying to teach my fans the latest tips and techniques for organizing their homes and simplifying their lives, especially when families are staying in their homes longer in this uncertain economy," Walsh says. "Keeping track of everything in our homes is now so easy with MyLowe's, the newest and best way to take home maintenance and planning to a whole new level."

Cutting closet clutter

Whether you have a spacious walk-in closet or a modest single-bar one, keeping your bedroom closet organized can be a challenge. But an organized closet means speedier wardrobe changes and a more harmonious environment.

* "We wear 20 percent of our clothes 80 percent of the time," Walsh says. Declutter your closet by getting rid of that 80 percent you don't wear. At the start of the season, turn all your hangers so that they face back to front. When you take something out and wear it, rehang it the correct way. At the end of the season you'll be able to see which items you haven't worn. Those are the ones you can probably live without.

* Reclaim vertical space. Look for creative ways to use the walls, backs of doors and other vertical spaces in your closet. Modular home organization systems can solve most storage challenges.

Taming the toy room

Children outgrow toys almost as quickly as clothes. It's important to regularly sort toys with your children to decide what to discard, what to pass on and what to keep.

* Involve kids in deciding what should stay or go. Arrange toys in piles by type of toy, age appropriateness or length of time the child has had the toy. This will help your kids see the toys as distinct groups and make the task more manageable.

* Bring in space-maximizing organizational products like colorful cubbies with canvas bins or decorative shelving units. MyLowe's makes it easy to find storage products that will fit in your space. Simply enter your room dimensions and the site helps identify solutions that will fit your needs.

Advice for every room

Getting organized is great, but staying organized is even more important. Rather than having to tackle organization tasks in a daunting mass once or twice a year, take steps to stay organized throughout the year. A little organization today means fewer headaches tomorrow.

Keep track of your home improvement and decorating purchases, like the paint colors you use and the creative choices you make with MyLowe's. You can create a home profile and sort information by room, assign products and wish lists to each room, track purchases, store product manuals/warranties and more.

Organization issues stem from the stuff you have, and not just from the space you have. Anyone struggling with clutter faces the decision to either move to a larger home or learn to make choices and live within the limits of their space. By reducing clutter and increasing organization, everyone can learn to honor and respect the space they have.

7 Things You Can Clean with Lemon Around Your Home!

Did you think lemon was something you squeezed into your salads or soups? Think again.  Household cleaning with lemon can be very beneficial. Firstly, it is organic and then it is cheap. The uses of lemon are many including, health, beauty, etc., but its effectiveness as a cleansing agent is rarely utilized by us. If you access all the home remedies for cleaning then a good majority of them will include lemon. There are many things that can be cleaned with lemon and very few that can't be.

Here are some home improvement tips for cleaning with lemon.

Cleaning With Lemon: 7 Household Things To Be Cleaned:

1. Copper Utensils: Many of your common kitchen pots and pans come with a copper bottom that blackens with filth and heat over time. You may feel why clean it as the food doesn't touch this area directly. For your information it is important for the copper bottom to be clean so that heat is evenly distributed while cooking. Scrub it with a piece of lemon and salt.

2. Brass Articles: You cannot use lemon to clean brass plated articles. They have to be solid brass or else it will erode. Statues, figurines, decorative items, etc. can be cleaned in this way.

3. Kitchen Sink: Many don't know, but cleaning aluminum with lemon gives great results. But just lemon will not suffice. Saturate lemon juice with salt so much so, that it becomes thick. Now lather up this paste with a soapy solution and rinse the sink. The lovely citrus smell it leaves behind will freshen up your kitchen.

4. Tupperware and Hard Plastics: Lemon can be used to clean good quality plastic above the marking of 6. To get rid of stubborn oil and food stains from Tupperware, soak it in lemon juice overnight. Scrub it with baking soda the next morning. It is also helpful in denaturing food smells. Do not try this with low quality plastic as it will erode.

5. White Clothes and Shoes: The uses of lemon as a bleaching agent is less know but it is one of its main benefits at home. If your whites be it clothes, shoes, or other garments have yellowed with age, then you can whiten them by dipping in lemon juice and sun drying.

6. Rust Stains: When you keep your clothes, handbags or shoes in contact with metallic objects then it may contract a rust stain.  The best home remedy for cleaning rust stains is to spray the area of the stain with lemon juice and dab with baking soda. Leave for and hour and wash.

7.  Glass Doors and Windows: The hard water stains or white patches on glass can be cleaned using the citric acid in lemon. Your french windows, mirrors and even your car windshield will sparkle after a lemony cleaning.

Resource:  Oneindia Living

Share with us your lemon household secrets too!

Tips for Hosting a Home Shopping Party this Holiday Season

Ways to Shop

You can buy products and services from direct selling companies in a number of ways. Here’s a list of some of the most widely used.

 

Home parties

The party plan method, most commonly associated with in-home parties, offers friends, family members, co-workers and other groups a fun and relaxing way to get together and shop. In most cases, the party host is responsible for inviting guests, providing light snacks and securing a venue to hold the gathering – usually in his/her home. On the day of the party, guests arrive and mingle and might use this opportunity to peruse products and services displayed. In many cases, a consultant will briefly introduce the products and services available, and provide samples or demonstrations to the group. Afterwards, attendees have the chance to ask questions or place orders. As a “thank you” for her time and effort the host will often receive discounted or free products and other specials from the consultant.

 

Person-to-Person

Many consumers are surprised to learn that the party plan method of selling didn’t begin until the 1940s. Even today, nearly 70% of all direct sales take place in a person-to-person manner. Consultants are happy to meet in private with customers to discuss products or services, provide demonstrations, fittings or other assistance as needed. The items orders are either shipped directly to the customer or delivered by the consultant.

 

Online

Most direct selling companies offer consumers two ways to shop online. The first is through a consultant’s personal Web page, which can usually be accessed from the company’s Web site. Customers who shop this way have more than likely been introduced to products or services by their representative in the past, and often continue to place orders in-person or by calling their consultant. If you don’t already have a consultant you can often enter your location or zip code on the company’s main Web site and a knowledgeable consultant will contact you directly. The consultant will still receive a commission for sales made online.

In some cases, customers can shop directly from a company’s Web site. This is less common and sales are still usually credited to a representative in your area who will likely follow up with you to make sure you are happy with your purchase.

The key thing to remember about online purchases is that you still have access to a helpful consultant who can provide knowledge and advice that just can’t be matched in a more traditional retail setting. Having this kind of access 24/7 is a key benefit to direct selling online.

 

Kiosks

Some consultants choose to sell products or services from retail kiosks, usually located in shopping malls or other high-traffic areas. These are generally run by the consultants, not the companies, so don’t be fooled into thinking your favorite direct selling company has gone retail! In fact, it’s more likely that you’ll find your favorite in-store brand coming to a living room near you as many retailers are discovering the appeal of direct selling’s personal touch.

 

Phone orders

Phone orders can be placed either through an independent consultant, or directly through the company. As with online orders, this method is customarily used by customers who previously made purchases directly from their representative and sales are generally credited to a consultant who can follow up with you after the sale.

 

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Resource:  www.dsa.org