DIY Anti-Burglar Projects

in Exterior designs, by Anne

These DIY anti-burglar projects relate to landscaping. Administering a few changes to your outdoor landscaping can go a long way to making your home more secure and less attractive to thieves. Burglars love homes with dense foliage and brush obstructing the view of the doors and windows from the street. Don’t indulge them. Below are just a few ways to start making the exterior of your home more secure.

Landscaping DIY anti-burglar projects

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my old DIY landscaped garden

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Trim bushes and trees by your doors and windows

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If you only have the time to do one security upgrade to your landscaping, this is the one you should choose. Making your entrances easily visible by the neighbors and from the street will help dissuade all but the most brazen and tenacious of thieves. In addition, a tree with branches near your second story windows can give a nimble burglar access to your home. Remember that trimming your bushes and trees is a regular maintenance medium, not just a one-time fix. See some other ways we’ve enabled affordable, DIY home security.

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Choose shrubs with thorns when planning DIY anti-burglar projects

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Adding a good dose of brambles is another way to make your house unattractive to thieves. Depending on where you live, climbing roses, cacti and blackberry bushes near your windows will leave their mark on anyone who tries to climb past them. These shrubs and plants also make great additions when updating your exterior designs.

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Nix those trellises for exterior safety

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Wooden trellises can be lovely when placed against a home’s exterior, perhaps with a climbing rose or clematis attached. However, those same trellises can provide burglars with an easy ladder and access to the upper levels of your home. Better to place your trellis out in the open or against your garage instead.

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Stow your gardening equipment

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We all leave our gardening equipment outside from time to time. However, if your regular gardening or maintenance routine includes using a ladder or step stool, you’re giving burglars another easy way to enter your home through a second floor window. Keep these locked away and out of sight.

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Consider a Rock Garden for DIY anti-burglar projects

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Low-growing gardens use pebbles or rocks of different sizes, along with delicate plants such as cacti, succulents or tender perennials. This type of garden can win you security on three levels: it doesn’t obscure your windows; it can contain plants with thorns; and the rocks make it difficult for thieves to get footing or place a ladder.

Don’t obsess about having your home burglarized, but neither make it easy for thieves. Look at the exterior of your home as a thief might see it and make any necessary changes. It’s easy and affordable.

Have you done any DIY anti-burglar projects? What other preventative methods have you implemented?

Author Bio:
Elli is a writer for YourLocalSecurity.com, a top seller of home security services. She enjoys blogging about family and child safety, home renovation and improvement, and simple home DIY projects.

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Living Room Extreme Makeover

in beautiful interiors, DIY Tutorials, our home improvement journey, by Anne
One of the hardest room in any house to design a make over for when you’re doing your home-improvement, is the living room. This was no different in our case. The living room was the last one cleared out and painted. As you can see in the first picture, the boring walls were covered with old-fashioned wall paper, and the floor, with a dusty, old carpet. Welcome to our living room design and extreme make-over!
One of the first things we did was rip all the carpet off the floors. They were better bare than covered in old, stained carpeting. The fireplace left much to be desired. The grey colour looked like blocks of old concrete. I’ll show you what we did with it in another article, transform an ugly fireplace with paint. We couldn’t afford to get it ripped out, taken away and replaced, but a coat of carefully applied paint works magic!

Living room design - before extreme makeover

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the living room when we came to view the old house

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work commences on fireplace wall

The top picture was taken on the day we came to view the property. Notice the old lamps and mat etc had been left in the house.
The picture above was taken after I started doing the DIY projects in this room. The living room design was a very daunting project where home-improvement is concerned, but I persisted.
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too many cracks to count

The end of the living room design is nigh. All the holes and cracks have finally been filled in readiness for paint.

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holes and cracks finally filled in wall

 

New living room design - after extreme makeover

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fireplace wall after extreme makeover in living room

The end result! The two designed items on either sides of the mirror are lights from Ikea. See how the fireplace was made over.

Now for the other sides of the living room extreme makeover.

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radiator wall before makeover

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right of window wall + radiator wall - before room design

Sorry about the quality of the picture above. I didn’t realise it until I’d deleted the other pictures.
I decided that this side of the living room could be used as a working space. The carpet was removed and so was the wall paper and liner, then work commenced.
We used the space as a home office while the home improvement was going on. I moved this desk back and forth, to remove the wall paper, wash down, sand, prime and paint. There was a massive hole in the centre of the wall which had to be filled with many layers of filler before any change could be seen.
Rest of window wall before extreme living room makeover
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window wall stripped - radiator wall done!

The radiator wall is finally finished, but the window wall is the last to be done.

With the back wall (the radiator wall) done, the picture hung, and the desk was moved to another part of the room so work could be started on the window wall. Notice all the holes and cracks which have had to be tended to.
This was an extremely difficult corner. The plug sockets had been gauged out and replaced when the paper was on the wall. (A complete rewiring was done on the old house). Filling and sanding, especially in this small space proved tricky.
Window wall after living room makeover design
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a cosy corner from which to work

The corner is now complete. The old, cream curtain is still on the window, but this little plaid number on the wall is my person addition to beautify the space. I’ve made all the fabric dressings for the house. You can see how this impacts your interior design in the linked article and make some for yourself. This is a wall curtain hung from what was meant to be a kitchen cupboard handle. I spray-painted it the same colour as the curtain rod and put it at the same height. The blue chair was given to me by my friend. This is where I write my books and blog because it’s comfortable. Note the wall curtain I made has another pattern on the inside so I can change them around in the summer. I’ll show you a step-by-step article, How To Make A Wall Curtain, of how to make it.

Working area design in living room space

From this…
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the working space design - before extreme makeover

 

To this
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design your office space in your living room

The fab screen hides that old green desk in one of the above pictures. There’s also an office chair behind it. The screen provides privacy and also separates the living area and working area, as my husband uses this space as a home office. It’s easy to design your own working space when creating your living room extreme makeover.

Finishing touches to the living room makeover

A wall curtain (see how to make it at the link)
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wall curtain usable on both sides

The underside of the wall curtain was made with a different fabric. This is for added use because it can be easily switched for a different summer look. This is very easy to make. The link above will show you how.
The left side of the window wall - before living room makeover
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left of window wall - before living room design

The left side of the window wall - after living room makeover
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the finished left side of the window wall

After the couches found their places and all the rubbish was cleared, a corner was finally found for the TV. As you can see, the other side of the window wall also has a window curtain. We’ve not done anything with the floor yet. This living room makeover took a very long time and lots of planning and crafty design. What hurdles did you have to get over to make over your living room? Is there anything from this makeover you can use for your home? See the rest of our extreme home makeover here and see how the living room now adds to the overall beauty of our interior designs.
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How To Pimp Understairs Cupboard

in DIY Tutorials, our home improvement journey, by Anne
Having storage space under your stairs can be a good thing. However, it can make your home look dull and encourage a dated atmosphere. Everyone knows that if you have a space for junk, junk will build up until it spills over into your living areas. Now you can say no to clutter because I will show you how to pimp your understairs cupboard and still have storage room left in it! All this - almost free.
What you can do with your storage cupboard under your stairs
Before
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dull, old understairs cupboard.

After
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haven to sit and talk on the phone

Here’s what we did to pimp our understairs cupboad: This top picture was taken on the day I came to view the house. The red carpet was smelly and old, and screamed, dump me, dump me! It was nice there was storage space, but I thought I could do something nicer still with it. I wanted the hall to extend out and give a feeling of space and elegance. The white door seemed to be in the way, stopping the flow of the hall (which was a nice size to begin with).


The good thing was, that once we’d remove the red carpeting in the hall, we realised that there was some old lino on the floor beneath it. This was better than the carpet and we lived with that for the time being.

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stairs, carpet-free

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the extent of damage on the wooden stairs

The carpet has now been removed, and the door is also gone, but as you can see above, the damage on the wooden stairs was so intense, it took months to fill all the holes, sand and paint the stairs. Nevertheless, this was a far cry better then the old, red carpet.


Transforming the understairs cupboard

Once we’d finished painting we decided that the floor, though raw wood, would look better without the old lino. It was removed and the floor was stained with cheap wood stain. This will have to stay until we can do better. You can see the complete effect in the ‘after’ picture above. The floor looks rather good.

 

wood stain makes a brilliant change

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understairs room - daytime chic

understairs room - night time elegance

What we did to pimp our understairs cupboard:

Removed the cupboard door.
Painted the cupboard the same colour as the rest of the hall.
Painted the skirting board the same colour - this joines both spaces and fools the eyes into thinking the two spaces are one room.
The floor was also stained, carrying the same colours and effects though.
Drilled a hole into the bottom of the wall in the cupboard and ran an extension cord into it from the living room. This enabled us to put a light into the dark space.


The storage boxes were spray-painted white. Spraying them is easier than painting because of the holes.
Cushions were placed on the boxes and a painting was placed on the wall. Choose a painting that compliments the colour of your wall.
Attach your phone on the wall and you have a telephone heaven in which to sit and talk for hours if you want.
The rest of the cupboard on the left hand side is still used for storage. Shelves and free-standing cupboards have been put there. You see them, but your guests don’t.

 

 

What the understairs room cost


We had all of the furniture, the soft furnishing, the light (hook on) and the painting. Left over paint from the hall was used. Nothing was bought specifically for this project except for the spray paint used to spray the boxes. They used to be natural wood. This cost about £3.00 in total. The spray paint was also used on other little things in the house.

Please share this article on creating an extra room out of your understairs cupboard if you found it helpful. As always thank you for joining the diy projects site. Follow the link for more DIY tutorials. There are several more articles on home improvement on this site.

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