We’ve needed some kind of stand for our turntable and records, and couldn’t find anything we liked on Marketplace, and didn’t want to spend $100+ for some particle board junk. So I built this mid-century modern-style record player stand over the weekend. It’s a super simple DIY project! Read on for the tutorial – but... Continue Reading The post DIY record player stand and using relative measurements appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer
Our house has been a power plant since 2017; now it’s also a gas station of sorts. In January, we signed a three-year lease on our first electric vehicle, a 2023 Subaru Solterra. We’ve never leased a car before, but felt it made a lot of sense in this case because a) EV technology is... Continue Reading The post Real-world range, charging, and fun: Our EV experience appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer
(Note: No cats were cooked or otherwise harmed in the creation of this blog post; Athena just likes to sit in a frying pan sometimes, like a total weirdo.) When we bought our house, one of my must-haves was a gas stove. My parents had an electric range growing up, and the first time I... Continue Reading The post I used to love them, but gas stoves are really bad news appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer
We installed a mini-split heat pump in our home in 2021 — not a whole-home system, just one wall-mounted unit in the living area, because that was all we could afford at the time. (The rebates are much, much better now — you can get $10,000 back from MassSave, plus up to $2,000 in federal... Continue Reading The post In data: Here’s how heat pumps can cut carbon and save the world appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer
There is simply no need to be forking over $200 a month for cable TV in the year 2023. It’s a waste of both money and mind. Afraid to quit cable? I’d wager half of what you watch isn’t even on television anymore, but on a streaming service like Netflix or Disney+. Need further motivation?... Continue Reading The post Are you seriously still paying for cable TV? appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer
We recently got our siding redone, a whole upheaval that included, among other things, temporarily removing our mailboxes from the front porch. But after all was said and done — with our house finally looking nice for like, the very first time in our tenure — we decided the rusty old mailboxes we got at... Continue Reading The post DIY mailbox: Build an British-style postbox with scrap wood appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer
It’s hard to think about heating oil in the midst of the hottest 21-day period in Boston’s recorded history. But while gas prices started dipping downward the past month, the cost of heating oil in Massachusetts is still up 72% compared to a year ago, at around $5 a gallon. That could leave many New... Continue Reading The post Step by step: Converting from an oil furnace to electric heat pump before winter appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer
There’s something pretty all-American about kids selling lemonade on the sidewalk on a hot summer day. And yet, a lot of modern American communities — I’m talking about those car-centric cul-de-sac suburbs off the highway — just don’t lend themselves to this smallest of business enterprises. That’s one of the reasons we think Quincy is one... Continue Reading The post How to make a DIY lemonade stand from an old kitchen cabinet appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer
Listen, I’m as shocked as you are, but there you have it: I’ve got an honest-to-goodness book coming out on February 15, called Home Buying 101. It’s published by Adams Media, an imprint of Simon & Schuster. It’s a soup-to-nuts guide to buying your first home, with practical tips on saving for a down payment,... Continue Reading The post I wrote a book! It’s called ‘Home Buying 101’ appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer
I was listening to Alie Ward’s delightful + insightful Ologies podcast the other day — an older episode about ocean health with Dr. Ayana Elizabeth Johnson. There are a million reasons to listen, and to do more to help our marine ecology, but there was one startling statistic Dr. Johnson dropped that I hope will haunt you... Continue Reading The post 10 ways to use less plastic at home appeared first on House and Hammer.| House and Hammer