Ep 14: Feeling Safe in Your Own Home: Your DIY Security Checklist
Welcome back to How to Handyma'am! In this episode, we are shouting out Aunt Rita, an amazing entrepreneur who is out in the world fighting for women's rights (and women's wrongs!).
We also introduce a brand new segment called "3 Minutes of Chaos" to help us stay on track, and we answer a great listener question about painting baseboards. Finally, Arly leads us through a super important masterclass: a DIY home security checklist to help you feel safe and comfortable in your own space!
Listener Question: Painting Baseboards
Mary Beth asks: "How do I paint my baseboards without getting paint on my wooden floors?"
This is a great question! If your baseboards are already painted and it's time for a fresh coat, here is the best way to tackle it:
The "Plastic Shield" Trick: Use a stiff piece of plastic (like a laminated sheet of paper or a plastic binder sleeve) and slide it right under the bottom of your baseboard. As you paint, just slide the plastic along the floor with you to catch any drips!
The Painter's Tape Warning: While painters tape is a classic go-to, use it with caution on wooden floors! If your floor finish is very new or very old and brittle, the tape might peel the polyurethane finish right off.
The Freehand Method: If you have a steady hand and a good angled brush, you can "cut in" the baseboards by hand. If you drip, just wipe it off the sealed wood floor immediately with a damp rag!
The Handyma'am Home Security Checklist
If you live alone (or just get easily spooked listening to true crime podcasts), here are some totally doable, DIY-friendly ways to secure your home.
1. Secure Your Doors
The 3-Inch Screw Rule: Most deadbolts and latch plates come with tiny one-inch screws. Swap out the screws on your latch plate (the part the deadbolt slides into on the door frame) for 3-inch screws. This anchors the lock directly into the structural framing of your house, making the door much harder to kick in!
Add a Deadbolt: If your exterior door only has a spring latch (the lock on the actual doorknob), you need to add a deadbolt. You can install one yourself using a drill and a hole saw kit!
Deadbolt Reinforcers: For an extra layer of security, install a metal deadbolt reinforcer. It's a metal sleeve that slides over the door where the deadbolt sits, preventing the door from splitting if forced.
2. Secure Your Windows
Dowel Rods: If you have sliding windows or double-hung windows, cut a thick wooden dowel or a broom handle to size and lay it in the window track. Even if someone pops the lock, the window physically cannot open. (Pro-tip: Home Depot will cut the dowel to size for you!)
Check Your Latches: Go around your house and make sure all the spinning latches on your windows are fully functional. If they are broken, you can buy replacement packs at the hardware store for just a few dollars each.
Window Clings: While not a physical barrier, window clings offer total privacy. They are essentially frosted stickers you apply to your glass with a little Windex, preventing anyone outside from seeing in—especially at night when your house is lit up!
3. Exterior Lighting
Motion Sensor Lights: Install motion sensor floodlights around the perimeter of your house. If someone (or an animal) approaches, the sudden bright light is an incredible deterrent.
Lightbulb Upgrades: If you don't want to hardwire a new fixture, you can buy motion-sensor lightbulbs that screw directly into your existing porch lights!
4. Update Your Locks
Change the Locks: Whenever you move into a new house or apartment, always change the locks! You have no idea how many previous renters, owners, or contractors still have a spare key.
Keyless Entry: Consider upgrading to a keypad lock. They are incredibly convenient, and since they don't use a physical keyway, they cannot be picked!
Lockboxes: If you need to hide a spare key, do not put it under a rock or a welcome mat. Buy a heavy-duty realtor lockbox with a combination code and secure it somewhere hidden on your property.
All of these security upgrades can be done over time, and you don't need expensive professional tools to do them! Borrow a drill from a friend, check your local library to see if they have a tool-lending program, or pick up an affordable drill from Harbor Freight or Ryobi to get the job done.
If you have questions about securing your specific space, send us an email at hthm@myhandymaam.com!
Episode Transcript:
Welcome back folks. Welcome to welcome to How to Handyman, the podcast where we support women's rights and women's wrongs. In this episode, we start the segment 3 minutes of chaos. We take a listener question and we tell you some tales from the field. And then we get into Arlie's teaching on how do you, how do you be safe in your own home, especially if you're a woman living alone? I'm Samantha. I'm Emily and I'm Marley, and this episode is dedicated to my Aunt Rita. Shout out to Rita Macphail, who loves Purple almost as much as I do, and she's also a badass woman entrepreneur, starting her own business raising 2 strong independent women and just fighting for women's rights and women's wrongs and just being just a badass woman in the world, staying strong and really doing her thing. Yeah, to make a difference for us all. Okay, friends and Thomas, our editor, we hear your feedback. We love talking and I have, we also have a few people who've said they're addicted to our chaos, which we appreciate you and you are very much our people. But we're going to do a new thing called 3 minutes of chaos where each of us get one minute and we will hold each other to the one minute. Arlene can't really. OK, but seriously? Really. Going to get my timer out. I don't really talk at all. It's mostly you guys. Yeah, you're definitely coy. You do know there's recorded evidence to the contrary? All right, anyways, so. How the? 3 seconds. 3 seconds. We just get one second to say something. We're done. How about 3 minutes of chaos is going to work going forward and we reserve the right to go back to significant banter, but we are going to attempt to do this. We're going to try and it doesn't mean our chatting section is going to be super short at the beginning. It means that the other chatting we do will be related to what we do, which is construction. Got 2 licensed builders and a field expert here. But sometimes we talk like that's not our job. Sometimes we talk like our job is watching TV shows and listening to podcasts. That's our side gig, yeah. It's our side gig, so we each get one minute today. Samantha has the timer out. Who wants to go first? Harley. OK, we'll go first. All right, Arlie, you started. Already. All right, I'll give you 1 Mulligan. OK, All right. Ready. I'm ready go. So I got annoyed today, but last night actually because of period products because I was like who who invented these? And I found out it was invented by a man. And I was like, no wonder these don't work because. How is that even possible? I don't know. I don't think that maybe he knew fully what was happening. Apparently he was inspired by his friend who was using a sponge. And then he was like, you know what, We should put a sponge inside of women. I'm sure that's exactly how it went so. 20 seconds. I was like, I was like this is terrible. But now some of the newer ones that are actually made by women like discs and cups and stuff are actually a lot more functional. So go women. But also Yikes to some of that history. Oh, good job. Arlie did. It beat the timer. Did it all right. Emmercy Next. No, you get to go. I don't even know what to talk about. Oh, I get the timer for yours all right. You can ask me a question. A. Question. I don't know what to talk. About how is the one time you're given an opportunity to talk, you don't know what. To talk because I'm more of a player offer than a come up or. OK, well play off of my period products topic ready. Yep, set. Go. I don't have a period anymore. Talk about pain. I am thrilled about that, although nobody tells you like when you're going through puberty, your hormones go crazy. When you are carrying a baby, your hormones go crazy. They don't tell you Round 3 is. Coming. Yeah, So like, it's not even like here's what to expect. It's like it could be any of these 147 things. It's a grab bag. You just like reach into this like dark hole and grab as many things as. She. Said at one time. And then you, you're like, OK, I got hot flashes. I got night sweats. I got almost no periods until I have a horrible period and moodiness. Oh, and some depression. That was a little one thrown in. So. Yeah. So, yeah. So being a girl sometimes is not for the faint of heart. But also amazing. Look at that. Look at us. We did it. All right, Emily. Maybe we have like some intermittent chatting in between the one no? No, because then we'll just end up with the same chaos as usual. That was my objective. I missed the. Chaos. She's like, this is the in between. Yeah, okay, Emily, Are you ready? Yeah, 321 start. It is February in Michigan, which is starting to be the cusp of spring. We get just a few little hints here and there, and one reason this is going to get deep for a second. OK. One reason I love spring so much is it says no matter how dark your life gets or what period of life you're in, there's always going to be a spring ahead, which I think is like so beautiful. And every year I'm reminded of that and it's so delightful. And also, seasonal depression can suck my ass and I have it really bad. And so like this week in Michigan, it's been like 50 something degrees someday. And I'm like depression. Ain't got nothing. I went. For a while and like, I'm going to be outdoors again. So, and it's almost some of my two favorite people's favorite time of the year because it's almost lilac season and I don't love the smell of lilacs as much as you guys, but I get so much joy from the joy you guys in lilac season. All right, I'm going to add on to yours that your time is up. Good job. I just want to say two things. One, that if you're in the greater Lansing area, check out a new business called Plant Joy. I thought of that because of lilacs, because tests from Plant Joy is going to help me figure out how to make my lilac Bush go crazy in front of my house. So I'm excited about that. And I also wanted to tell you about my favorite moment of the whole year. I live in a very tree heavy neighborhood. There's lots of beautiful old oaks and there's always one moment every year. And it's not the first time the leave the leaves are coming out. It's the first time I notice the leaves are coming out and it hits me like and I'm like I'm in awe all over again. I feel such delight and joy and I'm looking around all the little baby leaves on the oak trees and it'll be coming soon. I love it so much. Do you have any comments on Spring? Well, I love the smell of lilacs, first of all. And then also in the neighborhood that we're in, a lot of people have tulips, and those always showed up like. Practically overnight. Yeah, they do. And a lot of people in our neighborhood, I grew up in the like the boonies. So we don't really have. Get more wild. Stuff, yeah. And then also the houses are further apart or you can't see the houses from the road that we're on or whatever. So it's really nice to be able to just drive to work and see like 500 tulips. This is the first year my Peony bushes are. Oh, that's going to be beautiful. OK so transitioning out of non work topics. So we're done with. Three minutes of chaos is over well. Hold on, because let's just take a minute to say, like, first of all, I'm proud of us. Yeah, especially me, because I really didn't want to. She went into this kicking and screaming and she's. Now undermining the things she's celebrating to be. Fair Thomas, our editor, is her brother and whenever Thomas tells us that we should do something, Arlie's like he doesn't know what he's talking about. He. Like has so much experience, yeah. He's. Definitely one of us that knows what he's. Talking about, I'm like, I don't want to do it, I just want to do what I want to do. All right. Segment 1/3 minutes of chaos. We did it. But it's here's my segue. Still talking about spring, but work related. What is your single favorite outdoor project to do? Or sorry, that and best bang for your buck you think? I love to build things with wood, so either decks or fences. And a few years ago we needed to keep our dog in the backyard. But part of our backyard is actually like the back half of our driveway. And we had new concrete and I did not want to drill holes in it. So we're like, how are we going to do this? Well, we built flower boxes that were three feet tall, so kind of think like raised garden beds, but it's basically ended up being an 18 inch deep fence with a flower box in the middle. So they didn't need to be attached to anything. They just sit on the ground because they're heavy. And that was my favorite project. Love it. And nobody tell our dogs, but our two current dogs could definitely clear the. Could, definitely could, but they don't know that and. We're not letting them. Find that out. No. What's your favorite spring project? Is it planting herbs for Satchmo the Bunny? Yeah. Can you do satchmo noise for the viewers? Or. If he growls, he goes. You're the only like Sassy Bunny I've ever heard of. Oh you should get like the Bunny pages on. Facebook We had a Bunny, but we were bad Bunny owners. We didn't know till your Bunny that they could have a whole life so but. Ours was kind of a pervert it. Was let's not go down that path right now because this we're out of three minutes of chaos. But I love that. And then I think I really like, I like doing tile projects in the summer because you can cut outside and it's not terribly unplugged and. It's an excuse like you're working on an indoor project but you're outside frequently. And like being like, like having like your arms and stuff and like your shoes all wet and stuff isn't that big of a deal. Or if it's hot. You're like, you're welcome. Yeah, yeah. So that's not as bad, but I'm not. Most of the projects that I really love, like my things to do are usually inside projects, so. But I do like being outside to do work, so that's. Good, she's an inside cat. My favorite non work part of spring is sitting on our cupboard front porch. Yeah, I love that we got to install the ceiling fan. I got you. Yes, whatever the unique geography is of our neighborhood and where our porch is and where our house is, we always have a breeze. It's really nice, It's delightful. What's your favorite part? My favorite? Favorite project? My favorite before and afters are when we stain that decks. Because I totally forgot that we do. That difference, it's such a big difference, and proper prep is key. But unfortunately, composite is king because you don't have to stay in your duck and you do have to stay in your duck every two to five years, depending on how it was prepped or if it was prepped poorly. Sometimes you get 6 months before it starts peeling. But I some. Advice. I would never recommend anybody paint their Decker porch. Yeah. Now there are. Stakes. That look like paint so you can you can get that solid coverage if you need it but you don't want to use paint yeah because then like with stain it will just fade over time even like the solid stain will just fade over time but paint will chip and then we have to redo it yeah you have to sand it and chip it off and. We like Sherwin-Williams Super Deck and we also like Cabot brand deck stains which are sold at Lowe's and they have fun colors. Yeah, they do you. Can do like a blue deck of pink deck which I would do as you can see in listeners. I'm wearing a pink cardigan today which is my favorite color and but I just like the transformation it is pretty it's so much work I'm not going to lie if you DIY it, it's a lot of work not the deck itself. The damn spindles take years off your life but. It's a perfect example of why we do how to handy ma'am, because it's something where the materials might cost you a few $100, but you'll save yourself thousands of dollars in paid labor. So it yes, it will take some, it will take a lot of your time and some elbow grease, but you can absolutely do it yourself. That's so true. And remember, it's not so much about how good a pink Java it is, it's how good a prep Java it is. Yeah, that boy, that's true. With so many things, I want to recommend one product that is a stain adjacent. Well, it's really a stain, but if you have cedar, which is what we built that dog fence out of, I love. Cedar. We use Australian timber oil because it's more of an oil. It soaks in, it's not on the surface, it's more of an oil than a stain, but it has a tint in it that just makes your cedar pop and looks like cedar does. Yeah, it doesn't allow it to do that, Gray. Yeah, it doesn't let allow it to Gray like cedar typically does. It will Gray eventually, but not as quickly. Or you can reapply this stuff really easily. Yeah. I mean, we did ours in the summer last year. And so we're in the spring and we've had a bit of a rough winter and it looks exactly the same as it did. So I think we're going to get 2 years out of this oiling. Oh my, my personal favorite project because my deck desperately needs to be restained. But my personal favorite project is my husband Lucas and I did in like an hour the night before we had a bunch like a summer party in our backyard with 50 people is we got giant flower pots, put concrete in them, put turned porch posts, which are the ones with the cute. The decorative, the decorative design. And then instead of just a four by four, we did. Like the ones that have this circular, like they've been on a lathe. Oh, and then we put hooks on the top and party lights and then our pad. Yes, party lights. So that was really fun. I think it was like $150.00 total. I saw somebody do something similar. They took flower pots and put concrete just in the bottom and then they put plants on top. So we tried to do that, but our concrete didn't end up being heavy enough because we. Used. Plastic pots instead of ceramic pots and we should have used. What the video did, but they also had just poles, they didn't have posts they. Just had like. Yeah, like aluminum posts for their thing so. Black aluminum would look really nice for. Yeah, I think that's for party lights, yeah. So that's fun. I also like building garden beds which you grew a. Lot of vegetables last year. My husband is a plant scientist so we get lots of good veggies and he knows what's happening. So that's a boy job in our house. That's a Lucas job, not a boy job. I know, but he's the only boy who lives. In my house, it's coincidental. But planting vegetables in my house and something to look. Forward to is going to be one of our first long form tutorials on how to do it. Because I did, right. Yeah, I build them out of fence pickets that cost $4. So cheap. They're cedar so they're healthy for you because it's not great to have pressure treated exterior boxes. Not for things you're gonna eat, no. I mean, you can they say like the risk is pretty low, but it they're dipped in like copper, aren't they? There's a whole bunch of. Stuff, different stuff that might turn you into a superhero. I mean, if you're all about. That or give you cancer. So. But not all about that one, No, but. So we're gonna start doing long term long form. Sorry I can't talk today. Long form tutorials soon and we're really excited guess. What else we're going to start doing soon? We're going to start doing weekend intensives and you know. Why? Told the podcast. Thank you to the 100 this. The episode that came out today, we talked about thinking about it and here you guys are crazy. Samantha gets an idea and it's go. Yeah, Yep. Well, one week we were just like, one day we're going to have a podcast, in the next we had a studio. Well, you know those ideas. They have an expiration date You. Got to, I mean. You got to put them into action. So we're excited and thank you to the like 247 ish women who were like, sign me up because your response to our Facebook posts on a hey, we have an idea. What do you think about this was so overwhelming? That was so demure. Usually you're like, I have an idea, I know. I was trying to pretend like it was like not a forceful well it didn't come with a face so it's different. What in person I have an idea is a little demonic but this one had cute little like little stars next to it and said we have an idea anyway. Go. Yes, exactly. The response was so overwhelming in the best possible way that we're like, you know what, this is what women want and this is what they need. So June, August and October we will have 3 long weekend intensives for you to learn us. You will be there long enough to go home and apply the skills that you learn immediately. So pretty excited about that. They're all going to be in Lansing, I think. Oh, while we're talking about it, since this will come out, I think in a timely manner, we're going to be at the Lansing Home and Garden Show this year for the Yeah, both my Handyman and how to Handyman will be combined, so. Splitting the booth it's going to be. So cool the fence about going to the Lansing Home and Garden Show. Go and then come see us. Yes, Oh my gosh, you're going to be. There, I'm going to cry for those. It's going to be so fun. Listen to this after the fact or don't live nearby, yeah? So that's it's going. To be lots of fun. All the news that's fit to print, except if you want to learn about any of this stuff some more than you can find us everywhere online at How to Handy Ma'am. You can e-mail us at HTHM at my handyman.com. And if you go to my hand, if you go to how to handyman.com, you can put yourself on the e-mail list to get early release access to events. So that's pretty cool. We are so excited to meet you guys in. Person. So we're excited to empower women to take care of their homes because that is the mission of all of this. Arleigh grew up handy, but my mom and I six years ago didn't have any of these skills. No, we didn't. Or tools, so we were you 6 years ago. So that tells you you absolutely can do every bit of what we're doing. And we learned everything the hardest possible way with pretty boring teachers on YouTube. So we're living in the pizzazz to the YouTube teaching. Whimsical construction. If you're listening to this and you don't like it, that's OK. There's lots of boring teaching on the Internet. There's lots of more traditional boring teaching on the. Internet, because although we're trying the three minutes of chaos thing, I can't promise that we're going to stay on topic for the rest of. Our life, but it might make our chatting like 12 minutes instead of 30. Yeah. Yeah, so I mean so. OK, so we. Did our controlled chaos, our 3 minutes of chaos segment, we did our favorite construction projects, the spring segment. And next is on to listener questions. Yeah, we decided, well, Thomas told us it would be great. Thanks, Thomas integrated listener questions into our normal episode instead of the crazy talk we normally do. So this is a new segment in the main episode, which is listener questions and we'll likely take just one or two. But if you want more, we often do Q&A's on our side quests which come out on Tuesdays, which I don't think we've ever mentioned side quests. On the main episode. May not just tell. You about those you probably already know. Yeah, you know cuz we. You see it when you go to your. Platform. Yeah, but those are those are now going to be unfiltered chaos time. You've been warned. You've been warned. Yes. So I have a question for the two of you from Mary Beth, one of our listeners. Hello, Mary. Her question is, how do I paint my baseboards without getting paint on my wooden floors? They're already painted. The baseboards are already painted, so she has no choice and it's time to repaint them. So how does she do it without getting them on her floors? Arlie. Yes, thank you. You should use tape or some kind of drop cloth or. Whatever bite you so hard on this advice I have. A what on? The floor. Yep. So theoretically Arlie's suggestion is good, but the problem is depending on how old your wooden floors are, how long since they've been refinished the paint, other if it's really old or really new, the painters tape could pull the finish off your floor. I have you'd have to, you'd have to check and and do like a little test spot or something. But Emily has. Another's It's not a wrong idea, it's just one I challenge because it can have devastating consequences. So thanks a lot, Arlie, for suggesting that people and ruining their lives. OK, wow. All right. My thing is you use either a sheet of plastic, like a sheet of like laminated paper or like the plastic sleeves you put in binders, something like that some. Send. Like a plastic. But but one with some stiffness to it. Yeah, and you slide it under your baseboard, so as you're painting, you have it with you. OK. Do I guess? I love that idea for listeners. Are they just evilly looked me up? She just gave her some serious. Now an unstick guy. Or you can do what we do and you just cut it by hand. And stop breathing when you're cutting. Yeah, you should know this if you the nice, if you tape, the problem is you might not know if paint this way. I'm in the Painter state, Painter Club. You won't know. Put it on a T-shirt. You should. You won't know that paint got under your tape until you're all done and you pull it up, and by then it's difficult to get off. But if you paint by hand, So if you're at the point where you've been practicing that skill and you can paint it by hand, if you do get it on the floor, you can just immediately wipe it off. So yeah. I'm sorry listeners, you just watched me pull a piece of if dog hair out of my. Mind floors are not finished. Then you should definitely use tape. Tape or the plastic? You mean if you're open grain wood floor? What do you mean by unfinished? Cuz if they're totally unfinished, don't worry about it. Well, if they're like open grain, they haven't been finished yet or you're refinishing. Them. Yeah, Arley's absolutely right. Yeah, cuz like with we have worked with raw wood before where it has like a thin sealer or an old seal sealed. It's been sealed, but a long time ago. Then it's not really 100% effective. There's a way to tell what it is. If you can run a crayon along your floor and wax will get caught in the little grooves that you have an open grain floor either on purpose or on accident. But if you can run a crayon and it just basically like you've run it across a piece of plastic and you can wipe it right off, then your floors are sealed enough to not worry about it. How do I get the crayon out of? Migraine use Brown. You get a set of dental tools, then you creep it out carefully. Yeah. You can usually tell if maybe we'll have to upload some pictures because I feel like I can always tell, but I can also. I mean you can shine a light like sideways on it and you'll be able to see if there are indents in like places where paint could enter your because if it goes into the open grain, the only way to get it out is to sand it. Oh, you can put a little bit of water on your floor. If it changes color drastically, it means that it's not sealed. If it is sealed, then it will kind of repel the water. It'll sit on top of the sealer. So, and if you have a specific question or you want to FaceTime about your specific floor, then just let us know in the Hot Handyman Facebook group and we will touch base with you. Have you put tape on a floor and then it's taken up? The seal before, yeah, this is one of those ask me how I know situations, Yes. How do you know? Because I've put tape on a floor and pulled it off and it's pulled off the Poly finish. So it just leaves these like. On a floor or on like other pieces of wood? A floor like floors or trim? Either floors or trim, Yeah. I've had that happen with trim but usually 4 floors have like a different coating. But if they're old enough, if it's a new finish, it will come off. And if it's an old enough finish, it will also it's, you know how well I use this example and maybe people don't know this, but we used to go to a church that was really old. The pews were really old. It was this old beautiful church, but the Poly on the pews was like chipping, like nail Polish does. So you can kind of pick it off. So floors will get to the point where they're. Either of us ever picked it up? Where whatever top coat they have is has become brittle and then the paint will pull it right off. Do you have a good paint peel or Poly peel? Yeah. True, I believe you. I just have never done that before. So do we have any? That's the listener question, unless you want me to take another listener question. No. OK, then how about a tail from the field? Artly finished this beutamous, beutamous beutamous project that I think we talked about in the side quest, but they're custom storage boxes cabinet. Let me set the stage for you. This was an older bathroom with some beautiful old details, and the customer wanted the same kind of feel. So we redid the bathroom with like an off white subway tile and some other cool details. This amazing floor. Oh my gosh. You'll have to look at it online, but the customer wanted some cabinets. But you know how it is when you're in a relatively small bathroom and then you mount a cabinet on the wall, it really takes up a lot of visual mental space. Yeah. But you know, what you have in every wall in your house is cavities between the studs. So what we did when we opened her wall, when we took off the old tile and the wall was open, we created these spaces for custom cabinet. So they can't be super deep, which is fine for like toiletries, medicine stuff, makeup. Yeah. So Arleigh created 3 custom cabinets that fit perfectly into the stud cavity. So only the trim around them is flush to the wall. Everything else is inset. Then she wallpapered the insides of them with the customer's favorite wallpaper. And then she created custom tile shelves out of the leftovers from the floor tile. Then she built custom doors and then put these latches on that were like repurposed like old so they look like they belong with the age of the house. So it's good job. And she wanted to commit homicide part way through the project because like every project, something goes wrong or everything goes wrong. But she persevered and we talked about that. Me, I thought about the client. No, you. No you it requires a lot of stick to itiveness to do those fine details. Yeah, it does. One of the things that was hard was we didn't have enough tile, so we ordered more tile and then it turned out to not be enough tile. And I went back and I remeasured and I was like, it should be enough tile. It should be enough tile. Sometimes the gremlins just steal it in the night. I know I was like, I guess it went into the void somewhere and. I think it's important for you as you plan your projects at home, you might have a tendency to think like when something happens and things aren't going exactly right, like maybe DIY isn't for you, but that's that happens to all of us. It doesn't matter how long you've been doing this. I mean, this is a joke. Like you go take a piece of baseboard and you cut it and it's too long and so you go back and you cut just a nudge off and then you take it back and it's two inches too short. Yeah. These kinds of things happen, so just know if it's happening to you, you're in good company. And really the secret of doing good work in your home, good remodeling worker repair work, is the the willingness to not quit. Yeah, it's not a very like sexy or flashy skill, not quitting, but it's a really important one. Nope, It's not quitting and then having patience and being willing to redo something if if you are intent on it being like as close to perfection as you can get it, you'll have to be willing to redo it when you mess up because you're going to mess up. You're going to. That's how it goes. Also, the mistakes lessen over time. They do, yeah. They really do. Or they become like more of like a thing that happens. It's less annoying and devastating then like. Like we know when we cut tile around a microwave or an outlet and it has to be have an L cut especially at the bottom part of it is skinny or. AU. It's going to break. At least, yeah. You almost, I mean, sometimes you're lucky enough to get it right the first time, but not very often. So we just know, like in the beginning, it's like the end of the world because it's a lot of effort to cut, like cut L's, the cut other than just straight across the tile. And in the beginning it's like you almost want to lay down and throw a temper tantrum. And then you get to the point where you're like, welp, time to cut the next one. Yep. Before we get to the main topic, I have a design tip that we learned at this client's house. I mean that I've known before, but I've seen it in action at this House. I have one more tip too. All right, 2 tips and then we're going to take a pee break and then we're going to get into the main. Topic yes, so if you have an older home, one thing I love about our client for this project is she uses. The same. Materials throughout her home, so when the floor is tiled, her bathroom downstairs and upstairs and her entryway has all the same tiled floors which. Looks and. Now her fireplace, but it looks super error specific to the home because back when they would have been making these decisions, they mostly would have used the same tile and the same wood throughout the house because that's what made sense. But also it creates this really beautiful sense of continuity throughout your house. And also, if you love it in one place, you might as well put it in another place and not make another decision. But I just her house is such like an example of like really like having a style and sticking to it and like using the same wallpaper in a few different places and it's just like. So cohesive. Also a really good example of it doesn't have to be perfect to be beautiful. Like it's that the walls are that kind of not. It's like orange peel texture. It's got a little bit of a texture to it, but it's that stuff that's between drywall and concrete. And so like you can see like some seams on our walls and like, you know, obviously the doors in the door trim have been painted with, you know, 700 different coats of paint and stuff like that. But like you look in the whole general house and you just feel like so it's so beautiful. It is so beautiful and. Cozy but yeah if you have an older home and also if you have a new build cuz sometimes those aren't the best qualities. There's gonna be parts of your home that you notice that you mess up, but honestly, normal people won't notice it. When you're in your home, no. So, so my little tip is also from our client from this week. And she is a bestie of ours. We've been there forever, it seems like with a billion projects. But like Emily said, we did her bathroom downstairs with that tile and then we did her entryway with the tile. And then we did her upstairs bathroom with the tile. And then I did a fireplace with the tile. And we've been in like every room of her house. But this week we painted her bedroom because she's, she had us install wallpaper on one of the walls and then she wasn't too sure about the wall color. So she had us paint it since we were back here this week. And she was like, she called Samantha and she was like, it looks like turds and it's, you know, the, the color is the color. But she, we were like, oh, you know, wait the two weeks if you can, or like, wait a little while and see if you get used to it. And when we left, I was like, she is going to call us soon because she's one of those people that like, she loves it right away or she hates it. Yeah. She knew exactly. She knew how. She felt about it, yeah. And like, it's not like she was like, OK, yeah, it's it's fine. Like that's when I would say wait, you know? Yeah. But if you hate being in your room because the walls are like a color that you vehemently hate to you. Yeah, Yeah. Then like, it's I'm. I think there's no use waiting the two weeks. Like you're not going to suddenly fall in love with the color. If you're like, oh, this isn't quite the green. I thought it was going to be like, but it's mostly you might after a couple weeks, it makes sense. But if you're like that looks like poop, yeah, there's probably no coming back. Well, that happened in my office. I was like, I kind of want my walls to be a peachy color, guys. It's not a good color for walls. But my dad was helping paint and he called down and he was like, hey Amy, I got the first roll up. You might want to look. And he's like, it's really bright. And I was like, yeah, I hate it. And he said good, I don't like it either. Yeah, switch. Sometimes it's, you know, very clear. But if you're unsure, wait, you know but. And This is why getting paint samples in the actual space is important, because I just picked a color I liked under the fluorescent lights of Lowe's and I if I had just brought it home, I wouldn't know and I didn't like it. Yeah, yeah. Well, OK, time for the pee break and then we're going to get into it. See you soon. OK, so when I first written this topic by my brother, he was like, you're going to scare people by talking about we're like security. We're all I'm scared. Can hear sirens. I heard that. I heard it too. Sorry about. That, but we were being professional and continuing on women. In general, we were told to acknowledge the noises. Well, watch, you can't even hear. She's like. There's too much. Chaos happening. OK, we. Already had our 3 minutes of chaos. You're right. Geez, back to you. We can't control the sirens though. Oh yeah, this. This is exactly why we need home security. That's right. Tell us because of sirens Tell. Us about it. OK so we I'm scared to be home alone. Like not scared but I have a general sense of like normal fear I feel like. Guard money, you're fine. I know he's very aggressive. I'm spooked. And I have a dog. Yeah, it's. Spooked is maybe the right. I'm not like fearful or I would just leave, but yeah, but I am spooked. Yeah, especially if you listen to true crime and then you turn it off and go to sleep at night and then you're like. I fell asleep listening to true crime. So that's what it sounds like. Her arms are cut off, her head was cut off, her body was drained of blood and then left in a field. Yeah. All right, so you're gonna, so we're gonna talk about some things that you can do around your home to make it safer. If you live in your own place or if you live alone or if you live in a house or an apartment or an apartment, these are tips for you. Basically anywhere you live, these are for you. Let's do it. So we have 5 categories and our first category is doors. So the couple of things that you can do to securify your doors. Sure. I have 3 on here. Oh, OK. I think adding longer screws to your latch plates and deadbolt things so your door is harder to kick it in. OK. Check, that's good one. I think making sure your knobs and locks are not a certain brand because it has 70% of home break INS. I mean, may as well just say quick set. We're not sponsored by quick set so we don't have anything to lose by telling people. Maybe use quick set on your non locking doors? Yeah. But they're really easy to break into. So, and this is all alleged Quick set no See less please. Yeah, but alleged, alleged, alleged. Alleged alleged, but they have a lot of break insurance, so Schwab is usually. A good one. Option and Do you have any guesses? Make sure you think that was one of them. Deadbolts having deadbolts cuz I we were I was just in a house where the front door and the back door both just had a spring latch that's just the like little knob that you turn but. You can often. You can, yeah. So debt having dead bolts is important. OK, those are kind of on here. I have locks as a different category, but my other two were garage manual locks for garage doors. Like the human door in the garage, not the lift door. No, the lift door. The lift door, OK, apparently people can break in through your garage door. And I guess if they know what they're doing, it's not that hard. So I guess that's another another reason to make sure that the door between your house and your garage also has an appropriate exterior lock. Yeah and they have their for two. You can get 2 manual garage door locks for like 15 bucks on. Amazon. So if you're worried about it or if you don't use your garage very often, or you know, if your kids home alone in the middle of the day or something and you want to tell them to do that just for extra security, then, you know, a little Peace of Mind. All three of us have solved this problem by not having garages. I know none of us have a garage. Yeah, we don't have a garage. But also if you have any valuables like in your garage, we do store things. I mean, we put a heavy duty keypad lock on someone's garage who had like an old car, like a restored vintage car. So yeah. So those were my, those were my three. So the putting your putting big long screws like 3 inch screws into the latch plates and the hinges. So if this is your door and this is the wood that it butts up against, so your deadbolt goes like this. There's a little plate here that the deadbolt goes into, and then there's the little plate here that screws the deadbolt mechanism into the door. Both of those come with one inch screws. Typically you want with the door the one inch screws. I think sometimes that's all you can get in. But on the latch plate side you definitely want 3 inch screws. And that is because what the latch plate goes into that has the hole for the deadbolt is called a door jamb. But on the other side of that is the framing of your house. It's a stud. And so that's actually a structural piece. The jamb obviously is structural enough to hold your door up, but it's not like. They're normally 1 by 1, which is 3/4 of an inch thick. So you know the right person could kick the door in. And again, we're not fear mongering. We're just saying you can do these things and then be like, I did the things. Now I don't have to be spooked at home. Yeah, yeah. A little sense of security and a way to get, you know, protect yourself a little bit and have your fear kind of settle down a little bit. OK. Our next one is I have 3 for that. Well, I guess I have 4 is Windows. Make sure your locks are working on your windows. There's a video that we put out for the older locks where the kind of the spinny ones installing new ones because they do break overtime. Yeah, if you like. For me, if I lived alone, I would have like the cut off broom handles, like the piece of wood that you if you have a double, if you have this works for a slider. Think of a double hung window is like a sideways slider. So your slider has the door that slides back and forth and you can put like a cut off broom handle or a dowel from like a one inch thick dowel to keep the door from being able to open. You can turn it vertically and do the same thing on top of your double hung window, on top of the sash that slides up and down and it cannot be opened. If you don't have a saw, Home Depot's Tremile has a handsaw. They'll make you pay for the full length of dowel, but with a tape measure. Measure it and then you can sweat your ass off in the Home Depot. They will cut it for you. Oh, yeah, the the lady in the video that I watched, she was at Home Depot. I'm playing. And she was like, she this long down. She was like, we cut it for you. So they will cut it in Home Depot for you. If you're like me and you don't like asking for help though, head to the Tremill. Find the hand saw. But you can get like 8 feet of it for like 10 bucks, yeah. So you can do like 4 windows. You could go to an estate sale and buy old brooms and cut them up. Yeah, that too. They cost like a buck. OK, I have. So there's that one, OK. Two more. So that's window locks and repair slider door. That's a good one. Not on my list, but that's a good one. To is this is the category locks. No, this one is windows. Oh OK, sorry 2 windows safety of fire window. I don't know besides putting a sensor on your window. Think of jail. Bars, bars. I mean, you see those actually in major metropolitan areas where you're walking like from downtown into residential and other areas the the like first floor windows will have like the decorative wrought iron. Grids, or if you're Harry Potter's uncle. Then you, you just have to, people have to know, like you can't just put bars on all your windows because egress in case of a fire is important. So there are specific things that are meant for Windows that I don't know how they work because I've never had that, but they would need to open from the inside so that you could get out. Yeah, That isn't, I feel like it's not super necessary unless you're in like a very high crime area. I. Wouldn't do it just because I want as much natural. Light as physical. Yeah, me too. We. Live in the Midwest, so we live in places where houses are separated by 2030 feet. If you live in a neighborhood you're not you're not that close. People aren't generally in your neighborhood randomly. It's usually just your neighbors that are in the neighborhood. But if you live in a metropolitan area, like a really busy city, especially if you live on the 1st floor where people are always walking by your place, then I mean, you're literally going to have thousands of opportunities. Somebody's going to be not the nicest human. So it's. Not to scare people, but that's one of the scariest things you've ever said. Well, not. All those people are like going to be crazy serial killers, but they might see your Airpods sitting inside the window and just crack it open and grab them or something, you know? Remember, we're just talking about for your situation, what are the things you can do to be less spooked? Yeah, so the last one is I don't think you guys are going to get it because it's not technically security. It's more about privacy, which is window shades. Oh yeah. And I, I, I never thought about this before until I moved into the apartments that I'm in now because. You grew up out in the country. I grew up out in the country and like any of my windows, you could go up to it like completely naked. And like, even if you were standing right outside the window, you probably couldn't see it just because like, well, I guess if you were on the main floor you could. But like I couldn't, when I look from my driveway, like up into my bedroom, I can't see anything, you know what I mean? And then like my neighbors, I couldn't even see my neighbors from inside my. So I never really thought about it until I moved into, especially the apartment I'm in now because the windows face directly to a sidewalk that like hundreds of people walk by every single day. And so I was like, I really do need some shades for like the two weeks that I didn't have them at the beginning. Any kind of shades really. Or you use window cling too? I use window cling, yeah. That's nice if you don't want to put shades up. Yeah. And they're a lot less expensive than they are. So, but that's not really a safety thing, just kind of. Private, kind of think about it at night. It's like being on stage because if it's dark outside and your room is well lit, it's really easy to see in. Yeah, so that just always makes me feel a little bit more comfortable to know that I can kind of cozy. It is kind of cozy. I like mine has like iridescent like little shimmers in it. So when it's really sunny, it kind of like sparkles on the wall. I like. That we won't go into too much detail, but for those of you that haven't used a window cling before, it's not like the holiday clings that you get. It's basically a, it's kind of like what you do to your phone, your screen protector, only it's soft, not hard. So you can order a roll of it really cheaply from Amazon or buy it like Walmart. And then you put your spray Windex on your window and then you roll it out and then you kind of just work the bubbles out and that's it it. Doesn't sell it at hardware stores. They often have more options. Well, not than Amazon. Because you can get our neighbors have a window cling that looks like stained glass. Oh, that's after they put it up. We came home and they also are like antiquers. So I thought they had bought stained glass windows and had them installed because they look like stained glass windows. So they make some pretty cool clings. That's cool. That's cool. Yeah. I actually have a video that I haven't edited or posted of me installing it, so we can post that when we do this. Very cool. But these. Yeah. So let's just recap real quick checking the latches, AKA the locks on your windows, which you can buy packs of them and they're they roughly end up being like around $3 each. If the more you buy, you can get them for less. The window bars like a jail cell, which I don't think are strictly necessary. It seems kind of like overkill to me, but those are pretty darn expensive. I mean, if you've had your same window broken like 17 times, then like maybe invest in them because it's probably less expensive than whatever window you have. But they range like from 80 to like hundreds of dollars for yeah, like. Those are going to have a very narrow use. Case, yeah. Posts like you were talking about like dowels and stuff inside and I also the place that I was working at this week, they have a little piece of Velcro on the dowel so when it doesn't like fall out of your window, you can pull it out with just a tiny bit of force. That makes a lot of sense, but they. Just have one of those little round things of Velcro and then shades so. Next, item number 3. Is lights exterior? I was going to say yeah, motion sensor. So those were both of mine floodlights and motion sensor lights. Both of these are great for exterior because first of all. Skunks don't like. Them some some animals don't like them. First of all, it deters people from coming closer to your property because if your motion, if the motion senses it, they don't see the lights. Maybe they walk a little bit closer. The motion sensor lights go off and they're like Nah, I'll. Well, not only is it bright then, but someone inside has been notified by seeing the lights come on that there's movement. Yeah. And I can see it from we had floodlights installed right outside the apartment because I could not see. It's so dark on the. Backside walk, quite a way to get to an outdoor light. And so it like lights up the whole sidewalk so I can get inside and it makes it way less scary to walk like from my car inside at night. But I can see it from like my living room. I can see the light in the kitchen that lights up when like something happens. It's pretty cool. And then mine is a motion floodlight, but you can get floodlights that stay on all night depending on what it is or just a motion sensor floodlight. And they make them where they just screw into your light bulb. Like if you already have an exterior light fixture it it just works as a light bulb. I think one of the ones we have just screws into your siding and it has a little solar other panel at the top. Yeah, So it doesn't need. Doesn't need wiring or batteries. Nope and it was like 30 bucks on Amazon. Or they're pretty reasonable, yeah. OK, our category 4 is LAX. OK I will. First thing I've been dying to say this but I was waiting for the right category. When you move into a new house, change the locks. Yeah, to change cuz you don't know how many prior owners or renters have have a key still and you don't know how many tradespeople have had a key or have had temporary possession of the key and maybe still have possession of a key. You just don't know, and you know it's 99.999% of the time not a problem. But if you change the locks, you know it's not a problem. Yes. And I would like to say if you can't change the locks or like my house has we changed the deadbolt, but it does have like an original door handle that I really like. If that's the case, you can usually have a locksmith come and re key the entire house to a new key. Or if so, you can if you go to the lock aisle, if you match the serial numbers of locks, it's the same key. So you don't have to do it with a locksmith. But if you like really want this fancy lock in the back and something special, you can have a locksmith come and they'll re. They'll key all your doors with the same key which is just really handy. As well. Yeah, it is. And if you have a door that doesn't have a deadbolt, then you can add a deadbolt. And then of course, there are all the surface mounted kinds of locks, the kinds you see in hotels where you have the bar that flips over or you have the chain that locks, or they have a kind where it's like a little flippy thing where you lift it up and flip it and it locks. So those especially temporarily, if you, you know, can't get to a locksmith or you can't get a lock in, then having those like surface mounted ones are important. But again, don't put them in with one inch screws. If you're going to surface mount something, it should also have a little a bit longer screws. And the interesting thing about a adding a deadbolt is when we first started I thought you needed a saw to do that. Nope. You get a whole saw that fits in your drill and it's just drilling A jig and tore hole. Yep. Yeah, they're called paddle bits or spade bits. But for the big ones for like. Oh, the big ones, yeah. You need a whole saw in like a 2 three quarter inch, yeah. Like. That's nice. Yes, OK, I did have the lock with chain on. The one reason that I had this on is because I, I, it wasn't going to include it because I didn't want to scare anybody. But it is like sometimes I'm like, maybe I should put one in because we get an odd number. Well, I guess living in the boonies, nobody comes to your door to knock and like ask if you know about Jesus Christ or if you want to like, you know, donate for something. Nobody does that. And like here, people walk around like door to door because we live in a neighborhood and I was. Like of all kinds of fancy locks and you unlock them all to open the door. Yeah, it doesn't help you. So I thought maybe. Cuz then you can open the door but leave the chain in place. Is that what? You're thinking, yeah, yeah. So it seems like maybe if you are a little spooked, maybe if you have a lot of random people that come to your door or you know, whatever, maybe it's a good investment, but probably not 100% necessary. This is not for safety, but have you seen the dog gates? Yeah, unfold as you open the door. So I guess the human can, the dog can, the person, but the yeah. Oh, I thought you meant for actual dogs. No, you're human. The human can talk to another human or I guess another dog or something, but the dog or the cat can't go it like unloads. Yeah, yeah, yeah. OK, so this one is. I thought about this because you had installed keypad locks on all of the, the renter units and you were like, I'm not sure about like whether they can be like hacked or something. And apparently like as long as if they don't have Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, they're almost impossible to hack. And because they don't have a key, they can't be locked either, or I mean, picked. So they're like mine doesn't have Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, so it can't be hacked and then it doesn't have any place to put a key? I don't think so. It does have a place to put a key because if the battery fails you need to be able to get in your apartment. I don't have the key. Great. But I have the code and so does half of St. John, you used to have a key. You were given a key. Sorry maybe Jace hasn't I bet he Jace probably has the key cuz I think he installed the door lock anyway so that's a good thing. And not to say that ones that have Wi-Fi and Bluetooth are like super easily hacked, but this is just the research that I found is that. If they don't, they cannot. They're actually pretty safe. So that just takes a little bit of the mystery out of some of those, some of those. Locks. One other quick tip that our daughter Hannah, she does that's really good is when she walks in her house, she locks the door. That's what I do. Yeah, some of like mine, I have a little and so it it always, when it closes, it's always locked unless I unlock it, which I only do when I'm like bringing groceries in or something. When you're hanging out with Satchmo on the front porch. Yeah, yeah. OK. Two more in this category, which is first of all, either give a spare key to a responsible friend that lives relatively close to you, somebody that you trust that isn't going to give it to another person or whatever. Or get a lock box for those are. So smart, yeah. They really are. They're very hard to break into. You can only move it or change the code if you have the current code, which if you forget the code is rough. But if you keep track of your code, you'll always have a key. So you don't have to put it like in a flower, flower box or anything like that. You'll have it safe and then you can secure it either to like a bar or like one of those spindles on your porch or on like your siding on your house or whatever you want to put it on. The old owners of my house left one that they didn't know the keypad too, so I have a fake one at my house that occasionally I'll just put numbers in just to see if one day I crack it. Only 10 million combinations. Yeah, OK. And then the last one is deadbolt reinforcers. Oh yes, those are the Taco shaped things, yes. I like them, I think they're kind of cute. They are, yeah. You see them a lot on older doors and you're like, that's a decorative feature, but it's really a security feature. Maybe because someone cut the hole around? That yeah, well, I've done that. So if you think about the hole where your lock comes together, goes through the hole and connects together, you can get this Taco shaped brass or stainless steel piece of metal literally slides over it and then and it has a hole in it. So it goes over it and then you put the lock through, but it just provides that extra layer of metal. On your door that and they have ones that are double plated so you can put your handle and your deadbolt on it. Or if you have like they have so many different options and let me see those were 15 bucks or so pretty reasonable for one of them. So you know, I feel like those are pretty reasonable and I used to think like that's kind of overkill. But then I saw a kicked in door and I was like, I was like man. No, not overkill. Not overkill anyway. And then the last one is cameras. So security systems, this one's pretty common nowadays. Like people have the doorbells, the floodlight cameras, and then you can do, you know, however many brands where we've installed a lot of Ring Yeah, doorbell, yeah. I like my Google doorbell. I have a Google nest. Doorbell that I Oh yeah. I have, we have the ring and I will. For me, it's not just about like knowing if somebody's there, but if I'm spooked, I can literally go back through and see. So if like, like the day when something weird showed up on the porch, like I'm like, who left that on the porch? Yeah, she had cookies delivered, but it didn't say from a company. It was from a company, but it was just like a rando plate of cookies. Just like a platter of cookies. I'm like who left who my cookies on SO? Until a friend was like, did you get my cookies? I'm like, that was you. You're like. Poison cookies. We ate them anyway. Yeah, gotta live life on the app somehow. OK, I did the math to kind of calculate if you get like 90% of these things and you get the mid price. So like I know SimpliSafe is a little bit more expensive and then Blink door like the blank security system, which I've also installed not too hard to install in Ring seems like it's kind of in the middle. And then so I've, I've kind of done that with all of them and it's about $630. To do it all. To do it all, but I did do like window latches. You have like 10 of them or something, Yeah. And then two like door locks. So getting like that's just kind of a basic. You could even pick like 2 things to tackle this month and then next month put in another couple things. So it's a lot of money, but also I feel like it's not in over. I mean, it's not like $5000 or something. Yeah. And this is like you doing it yourself and all of these things. I mean, the most intimidating thing is probably the camera install. But yeah. So those are those are our five categories of home security and safety. And if you guys have like any weird spots in your house where you're like, this isn't a window, but it's also not a door. Like what do I do? Send us some pictures. Yeah, we can definitely help. Yeah. And. If you think about it, it's somebody else will have that same question. So yeah, by asking, by emailing us where we can answer it on the podcast or by putting it in one of the groups, then other people will see it and we'll answer it. It's not. It's helpful to you, but it's also helpful to others. There are no dumb questions here. No, there isn't. But keep yourself safe. And you know what? Even if you're like, odds are I you know this isn't gonna happen, nothing bad's gonna happen. Odds are you are right. But if you're worried, just do a little bit to protect yourself. I think every. Single one of those things could be done with a drill. Yeah, that's one of the things that I was really excited about is because some of them you, depending on where your windows are and how high up you can put your floodlights, you might not even need a ladder for some of these things. And you can do almost all of them yourself with. I mean, I don't even think you need a drill. You might just need a. What's it called? Screwdriver. Yeah, one of those things, that unusual thing. And we, we do prefer like DeWalt and Milwaukee, we use both of their drills. One reason we use a more expensive drill pack is because we use them a lot. Yeah, we use them a lot. But you can get brands like Harbor Freight is a great place to get less expensive power tools. Ryobi is a consumer that's. A great. It's a homeowner. That's at Home Depot. They have hyper tough, I think at Walmart. So you don't need like the Super big name brand things with for like drills and things that you don't use that often, but like you use for installing these things or pictures or things like that. So I just want to encourage you. You don't need to start at the high level. We need everything name brand usually because they have good warranty and they have they are for pros so they may be used and. Rolled up and we use the ones with batteries because it's not practical in the field to be using things that are plugged in. But for you, you can especially buy tools that and your normal case. You can run an extension cord and run that tool and it can be really inexpensive. And we've said it before and we'll say it again, find your tools on estate sales, ladies. Also, do not forget that you have a community out there. You have neighbors and friends probably on Facebook that will lend you their tools. You know, if you need something for a little while and on our had a handyman page, you might have somebody who lives kind of close to you that might be willing to help you out and let you borrow something for for your project. Also my. Library does tools. Yeah, that is so cool tool. Check out. That's pretty awesome. That is check your library. All right, well, that's all the time we have for today. Thanks for joining us. Stay safe and we love you. We love you.
