RLROUSE Infoblog

Articles and information to power your life!

A Great Home Lighting Project: Adding Cove Lights

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Looking for a unique remodeling project that will make a big impact without breaking the bank? Consider upgrading your family room, dining room, or bedroom with cove lighting. Cove lighting is a form of decorative lighting used in many restaurants, hotels, and high-end homes. However, it’s relatively inexpensive to install and it can absolutely transform any room of your home.

Many homes already have all the makings for beautiful cove lighting. If you have a partly recessed ceiling with crown molding in any room of your home, adding cove lights will be easy. You can simply affix thin lighting strips to the top of your crown molding (or any other recessed section of the ceiling) and “wash” the ceiling with light. The result is indirect, elegant lighting that creates an interesting visual effect. [Read more…]

How To Find The Right Window Treatment

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The variety and choice of window treatments is currently immense, and this makes choosing the right one for the right room very difficult. To be clear there is no ultimate right or wrong, but there are some practical guidelines you can follow.

This article gives an overview on how to find the right window treatment for your needs and the needs of the room you need a window treatment for.

1 – Bathroom

Curtains, especially long ones, are a bad idea for a bathroom, as the likelihood of the material developing mould is so much higher than with other window treatments. It is recommended to avoid combining bathrooms with curtains. Venetian blinds on the other hand are very useful, especially PVC venetian blinds, as they are made of plastic so are easy to clean and to get the condensation off them, and their slates also give you full control over the privacy you wish for the room. This is particularly important if you don’t have patterned glass. [Read more…]

6 Things to Know About Renting a Car in Europe

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Europe has a great train network, but sometimes you don’t want to have to rely on a train schedule to get you where you need to be. For those times, a car rental may be just what you are looking for. So are you ready rent a car in Europe? Great! Here are 10 things you must know before getting behind the wheel:

1 – Learn Local Signage

If you’re going to be doing any amount of driving, it never hurts to learn what the road signs are going to mean. Some things will be the same, for example red means stop, yellow means caution, and green is go. A call to your travel agent should get the information you’re after.

2 – Car Rental Insurance

You might think your home auto insurance will cover you in Europe, but chances are, it’s not going to. The most common way to get insurance is through the car rental supplier, however your credit card company may offer that service to you. If that’s the case, call them well before your departure and have them send whatever documentation is required so you can take it with you. [Read more…]

How to Explore England on a Shoestring

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There are many words we associate with England, from ‘history’ to ’roundabouts’ to ‘teapots’, but ask anyone who’s actually been to the old country and they’ll probably trump you with another: Expensive.

While it’s impossible to argue that England is a costly place to live – house prices, apartment rental fees and gasoline taxes are among the highest in the world – common perceptions that the whole country is a cripplingly expensive tourist trap are wide of the mark. At least, it doesn’t have to be pricy. With just a little prior knowledge, and some on-the-ground smarts, England can be an ideal shoestring destination. [Read more…]

Social Media Apps to Help You Quit Smoking

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You know you need to quit. After all, smoking kills more than 400,000 people every year in the United States alone. However, quitting smoking is almost always insanely difficult, but thankfully this high-tech age we live in offers a lot of options to help kick the habit once and for all. Here are some apps for your smart phone that will help you finally quit smoking for good.

1 – Facebook

Though not specifically designed for quitting smoking, Facebook seems to be helping a lot of people break free from their cigarette addiction. People who are trying to quit can use Facebook to garner support from friends and family or find smoking cessation groups where they can talk to fellow comrades who are going through the same struggle.

The ability to post status updates allows people to announce their quitting progress to their entire group of Facebook friends, which helps keep them accountable and motivated. When you have all your friends cheering for you, the last thing you want to do is let them down. [Read more…]