7 Ways to Live Healthier

Keep your house clean and healthy with these natural tips for dealing with dirty work
Instead of opting for commercial cleaners -- which can be pricey and chemically dicey -- hit your pantry for more natural alternatives. Baking soda will absorb odors, clean counters, and even clear clogged drains when mixed with vinegar.Lemon juice can brighten your laundry, freshen drains, and polish metals. A mixture of vinegar and water cleans glass, mirrors, and hardwood floors.

Creating Openness

It's better to have fewer items on display when there's limited room to showcase them.Ask yourself if a piece adds beauty to your home or if it just adds clutter. Instead of hanging an assortment of random frames here and there, hang an oversize painting , like these homeowners did between the dining room and kitchen. Tips for Creating OpennessIn the living room, a comfortable sofa and one armchair provide seating. Both items have exposed legs which give the illusion of more floorspace. The furniture's neutral tones blend well with the wall color, a simple trick to open up the space. The coffee table is another example of visual trickery. The glass top has plenty of room for magazines or flowers, but the top disappears with minimal accessories, allowing a view of the hardwood floors below.

Creating Continuity

One of the easiest ways to create continuity in several areas is to use the same flooring.

Here, the homeowners chose to refinish the existing hardwood floors . The expanse of gleaming wood draws the eye from room to room.

Pale Palette..

A pale palette goes a long way toward visually enlarging the rooms.

Warm white paint on the walls brightens things up, making the most of natural light. White paint on the ceiling makes it seem even taller. If you're lucky enough to have high ceilings, enhance them by using tone-on-tone colors on the ceiling, walls, and trim. Even a tiny space feels larger when it has a lot of headroom. Texture keeps the color scheme interesting. Woven fabrics on the sofa, armchair, and dining chairs contribute to the casual but sophisticated look. Monochromatic hues work best when a color is used in all its varying tones. If you don't believe cream and taupe come in more than one tone, pick up a paint card at a home-improvement store.

Decorating,The Best Tricks for Small Spaces

Tricks for Small Spaces

Most new homeowners, seeking to add their own personal style to a house, find themselves rearranging furniture and repainting walls. Not so for the owners of the historic shotgun house. First, they had to make the structure habitable by putting in electricity and plumbing. They also wanted to alter the traditional layout -- a series of small rooms, one after the other -- into something more appropriate for modern living. The homeowners removed doors that closed off each room and had a wall torn down between the dining room and kitchen. Now, the long, open space is casual and comfortable, a perfect example of how to maximize minimal square footage . From the front door, visitors can see the dining area, kitchen, and even the back door.

Create a hidden retreat

See how one landscaper made every detail count in a tiny urban backyard.

Privacy on a small city lot is an all-too-elusive concept. But in a neighborhood of compact lots, this San Jose, Calif., backyard — which sits right up against two-story houses — includes a pergola-sheltered hot tub for long, slow soaks behind a curtain of vines. Landscape designer Cathy Drees managed to create a tranquil outdoor room thanks to a sophisticated color palette, a screen of greenery around the perimeter and a few artfully chosen accents.

At annual builders' show, small is in

Among the trends highlighted at the International Builders’ Show, more Americans are saying goodbye to McMansions and are buying 'right-sized' homes instead. There’s also high interest in green elements, organization, fewer luxuries and These days, a bigger home isn't always a better one: Recent research suggests that homes being built today are getting smaller.
The average size of homes started in the third quarter of 2008 was 2,438 square feet, down from 2,629 square feet in the second quarter, according to the U.S. Census Bureau. Similarly, the median size of homes started in the third quarter was 2,090 square feet, down from 2,291. The statistics confirm what the housing industry has suspected for a while.
"We've been hearing for a long time 'Why is the home size not declining?'" said Gopal Ahluwalia, vice president of economic research for the National Association of Home Builders. He spoke about the trend at the International Builders’ Show in Las Vegas this week. Anecdotally, he had heard smaller homes were being built as housing prices tumbled and the economy began to weaken. Still, "we never had data to back it up," he said.practical appliances