One feature I’ve decided I’d like in my new dishwasher is a stainless steel interior.  The alternative is plastic.  A plastic interior is more likely to break down harmful chemicals into the water supply, onto your dishes and into the air you breath when the plastic gets hot.

Stainless steel will also aid in the quicker drying of your dishes and it’s more durable.

Once you have your dishwasher, make sure you use a dishwashing detergent that’s free of phosphates.  Phosphates are harmful to aquatic animal life.

You can read more about Green Dishwashing at Planet Green.

Tags: Dishwashers

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 22nd, 2009 at 1:40 pm and is filed under Appliances, Green Homes, Kitchens. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Unfortunately, I’m in the process of looking for a new dishwasher.  My current one is only 5 years old.  It’s an Amana and it’s very loud.  We have to leave the room for the first hour it’s running.  The bottom rack wore down in places and the plastic came off.  Now the metal underneath is exposed and has turned rusty.  It leaves rust marks on my white dishes. 

I had a repair guy come in.  It cost $125 for him to just walk in the door.  He said the cost of just the parts to fix the machine would be a couple hundred dollars.  He thinks that at this point we should just buy a new one. 

Needless to say, I won’t be buying another Amana dishwasher.  The repair guy recommended Bosch.  He said he rarely has to repair them.  That even the cheapest Bosch would be better than most other brands.  I found this view was supported online: “In recent appliance-reliability surveys, Bosch dishwashers are the quietest and most reliable dishwashers overall.”

I looked at the Bosch dishwashers in the store and noticed that that racks have very small slots for plates and bowls.  The guy in the store measured them and they were only an inch apart.  My dishes are deep and won’t fit into the Bosch machines. 

I’m on to researching other machines.  The KitchenAid dishwasher looked good.  It was  stainless steel inside (as opposed to plastic) and the slots for dishes were wider.  So,  next I’ll research KitchenAid and some other brands.

Tags: Dishwashers

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 22nd, 2009 at 11:27 am and is filed under Appliances, Kitchens. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

This article shows one of the dangers of renovating your home – asbestos. According to the article: “If asbestos-containing materials are found, don’t panic - they can be safely removed and disposed of by trained and qualified workers. If the materials are found during work, stop work immediately and have qualified professionals remove the material before resuming the project.”

http://www.chiff.com/a/asbestos-renovations.htm

Tags: asbestos

This entry was posted on Wednesday, January 21st, 2009 at 8:07 pm and is filed under Dangers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

The most difficult part of any renovation is managing contractors.  Most in the business are honest and responsible.  But no one would deny there are a few bad eggs.

Here’s an article that can help, by discussing a ‘reiterate-and-confirm letter’.

Did you know that you can create a binding agreement without securing the other party’s signature? A simple letter that I call a "reiterate-and-confirm letter…"

It’s from a book called The Homeowner’s Guide to Managing a Renovation, by Susan Solakian.

Tags: contractors, reiterate-and-confirm letter, renovation

This entry was posted on Tuesday, January 20th, 2009 at 9:14 am and is filed under Contractors. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

Hello. I need to start posting more.  Today’s post is about custom cabinets. I recently came to a website that shows how to buy custom made cabinets. The advantage of a custom cabinet is that, unlike a cabinet that you buy in a store, it is designed for you specifically, and it will fit your room as well as you want it to. The bad thing is they’re more expensive. Anyway, here’s the website with the information. They have an example of a custom cabinet, also:

Tags: custom cabinets

This entry was posted on Monday, January 19th, 2009 at 9:40 pm and is filed under Cabinets. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.