Jeremy Herndon

In my campaign to save money I’ve been thinking about replacing our exterior back door’s deadbolt lock with a remote control keyless deadbolt.  There are many times when one of the family members goes out at night and leaves lights on out by the door simply because it makes it easier for them to see the lock to insert their key to get into the house.  There are plenty of other lights around that area to help them see their way to the door.  (Those are motion sensor lights.)

I’m thinking that it would be really nice to have the remote because there are a lot of times folks have their arms full and can’t easily unlock the door with their keys.  Pushing the remote button on their keychain would let them enter the house more easily.  It would also let them into the house quicker if they felt threatened in some way.  I’ve been looking around on the Internet for price ranges and styles and it seems that they will cost about $100.  I was glad to see that some of the systems have additional remotes available so that all of our family members can have one.  Naturally these locks will also work with a key if necessary.

Guest post written by Derick Burks

It’s a girl! I can still hear the nurse saying those three wonderful words some twenty-one years ago. Pigtails and onesies have been replaced with trips to the salon and the mall with her mother, and let me say that I think my wallet misses the old days just about as much as my heart does. Nonetheless, that blonde hair and pretty blue eyes that she got from her mother have never changed. As much as I want to keep my little girl close, I know that she has grown into a strong, independent woman and now has to strike out on her own and find her place in this world. But how does a father say goodbye to his sweet little girl? That’s right, by making sure that her new home has an alarm system. Luckily, a quick internet search for Security systems St. Louis allowed me to find just the right system for daddy’s little girl. Now rest assured that this is one daddy that will be tearing up the road between our house and hers but at least I feel safer knowing that when I’m not there with her, she at least has a security system installed.

There is absolutely nothing more annoying to me than to come home and find that all of the lights in the house are on, but no one is in most of the rooms!  I can’t seem to educate certain folks that we need to save money by turning off lights when we leave the room.  Well, I just found out that Black & Decker is releasing for sale motion detector light switches that will turn the lights off automatically after a few minutes of detecting no motion.  The price sounds reasonable, about $30 per switch.  They are supposedly going on sale in April.  I’ve signed up to receive an email notice from them when they come out!  I am DEFINITELY going to buy several!

Several years ago my mother-in-law gave us a couple of dining room tables with matching chairs. She was in the process of moving to a smaller house and was giving away a lot of furniture. The chairs were in very sad shape, however, and the seats in about half of them needed to be replaced. We didn’t know how we were going to fix them, and so they have been gathering dust for a couple of years in the garage. My wife has been reluctant to throw them away, so I was humoring her.

Yesterday a box arrived on the doorstep – a box full of new seats for the chairs! Seems as if my resourceful wife found a website where she could buy replacement seats and she ordered them, just in time for the family gathering planned for later this week! Now all we have to do is break out a couple of screw drivers and fix them up!

Most people enjoy this time of the year with all the leaves turning such beautiful colors, in all their glory. But as the old saying goes “Nothing good lasts forever” all of those leaves seem to fall in my yard and property, what a pain in the rear this turns out to be each fall.