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How To: 7 Great Things Black Pepper Can Be Used for Besides Cooking

Like table salt, black pepper has its unexpectedly handy uses that goes beyond seasoning your meals at the dining table. You can use black pepper to keep ants from invading your home, drive away bugs from eating your delicious garden vegetables, temporarily fix a radiator leak, and even stop bleeding on a minor wound.

How To: Open a Door Chain Lock or Bar Latch from the Outside

Assuming that you're not a burglar-in-training, you may one day find yourself in a situation where you have to break into a home through a door chain lock. But what to do if you have no time to wait for a locksmith?

How To: Chill a Lukewarm Can of Soda in Less Than 5 Minutes

A lukewarm can of soda placed in a refrigerator can take about 45 minutes to chill. On the other hand, a lukewarm can of soda placed in a bowl of ice, water, and table salt can take less than 5 minutes.

How To: Make Your Own Recycled Paper at Home

If you've ever wondered how paper gets recycled, find out for yourself by turning your used, unwanted paperwork into fresh homemade paper that you can use again. Any type of paper can be recycle, whether it's used computer paper, paper grocery bags, or old flyers.

How To: 7 DIY Ways to Remove Oil Stains from Your Asphalt Driveway

If you have an oil stain on your asphalt driveway, wipe up the excess oil with an absorbent cloth or mop it up, then act quickly using the common household items below to make sure that it doesn't become a permanent eyesore or a headache to clean up later.

How To: Collect Safe Drinking Water from the Wilderness

Without water, human beings can only survive for a few days. When you are out in the wilderness, knowing how to collect safe drinking water can be a matter of life or death. Large plastic bags are extremely handy for collecting condensation from grass and tree leaves, as well as creating a solar still. Dew water can be collected very easily with a clean towel and a small bowl. Large waterproof vinyl sheets are especially good for keeping your belongings from getting wet—and for collecting cle...

How To: Make Your Own Temporary Tattoo

Whether you need very temporary skin art for a costume or simply want to test-run a potential tattoo design before it gets permanent, making your own temporary tattoo only requires wax paper, a printout or drawing of your desired design, black eyeliner, rubbing alcohol, baby powder, liquid bandage, and a lot of patience.

How To: Make Your Own Non-Toxic Sunscreen at Home

Getting sunburned sucks, and according to the Environmental Working Group's 2012 survey of over 800 sunscreen brands, 75% of them contained potentially harmful ingredients linked to hormone disruption and even cell damage that may lead you to skin cancer. Yikes.

How To: 9 DIY Ways to Painlessly Remove Splinters from Your Skin

Removing a stubborn splinter from your finger or foot is never fun, especially if it involves digging into your skin with a needle or tweezers. But if you use common household or food items around the house, you can remove splinters from your skin very easily and quite painlessly.

How To: 9 Common Household Items That Can Unstick Your Stuck Zipper

Sooner or later you're going to have to deal with a stuck zipper, whether it's on your favorite jacket, backpack, or pair of pants. Simply tugging hard on the zipper tab hardly ever works, but a few things lying around your house might do the trick.

Guerrilla Gardening 101: How to Make a Seed Bomb

Build up your arm strength and beautify your local community in a single stroke by dropping homemade seed bombs in and around your neighborhood. A guerrilla gardening technique anyone can participate in, seed bombing is a fun and effective way to add tiny oases of wildflowers and healthy green plants in vacant lots and other overlooked and neglected parcels of land.

How To: Read Your Own Palm Lines

Palmistry is the art of characterizing or foretelling the future through the reading of palm lines. Though there are certainly many variations and techniques when it comes to interpreting the meaning of palm lines, you can brush up on Palmistry 101 by getting acquainted with your four major palm lines: the heart line, head line, life line, and fate line.

How To: Make an Upside-Down Tomato Planter Using an Empty Soda Bottle

Combine your passion for drinking soda and growing your own vegetables by making an upside-down tomato planter! This gardening project is especially great for people who have limited space for growing their own green things. To make this, you'll be using an empty soda bottle, aluminum foil, masking tape, twine, potting soil, and other simple materials.

How To: 7 Ways to Cook a Campfire Meal, No Pots or Pans Required

To make yourself a tasty meal during a camping trip, all you need are chopped up raw meats and vegetables, glowing embers, and a roll of heavy-duty aluminum foil. Simply place ingredients in a tightly wrapped aluminum foil packet, place on hot embers, and wait until everything inside is fully cooked.

How To: Create Giant, Reusable Bubbles Out of Elmer's Glue & Liquid Starch

Creating giant, reusable bubbles at home is easy, and it's a fun project for children. Just dump a whole bottle of non-toxic Elmer's Clear School Glue into a bowl, add fine glitter and watercolors (or food coloring), and slowly mix together Sta-Flo Liquid Starch to form a pliable concoction.

How To: Make a DIY Photo Projector with a Shoebox & Smartphone

Want to show off vacation photos on the big screen or project goofy videos on the wall? Using a shoebox, magnifying glass, and a smartphone, you can make your own photo or video projector for super cheap.

How To: Wash Your 'Dry Clean Only' Clothes at Home for Cheap

Dry cleaning can be a pain the butt, not to mention super expensive, especially if you're wearing a lot of wool sweaters during the cold winter season. Thankfully, with a little time and effort, you can wash most of your "dry clean" or "dry clean only" clothing at home.

DIY Cat Repellent Spray: 3 All-Natural Recipes That Are Safe for Indoor & Outdoor Cats

Whether you want to prevent your cat from scratching up the couch or deter stray cats from using your front yard as their personal litter box, a DIY cat repellent spray can go a long way in keeping unwanted furry guests away.

How To: 16 Uses for Wire Coat Hangers That Have Nothing to Do with Hanging Clothes

Do you have an excess of wire clothes hangers from multiple trips to the dry cleaners? Rather than letting them take up space in your closet, you can use them for any number of things, from holding your necklaces and magazines to unclogging your sink and fishing dropped objects behind furniture.

How To: 13 Unexpected to Downright Crazy Uses for Mason Jars

Invented by Philadelphia tinsmith John L. Manson in 1858 for canning and preserving perishables, mason jars are experiencing a major resurgence in the DIY community. In addition to being a handy storage device for both food and non-food items, its old-timey, quaintly antiquated look also makes for good drinking glasses, candle holders, flower vases and eye-pleasing decorations.

How To: 8 Weird, Non-Food Uses for Your Freezer

Other than keeping your popsicles and frozen veggies frosty, who would have thought that your everyday freezer had so many uses? Just like your dishwasher can be used for many non-cookware items, the freezer can be used in a variety of useful ways that don't involve perishable food.

How To: 9 Ways to Cool Down Your Burning Hot Mouth After Eating Really Spicy Foods

Mouth burning with pain from eating too much hot sauce or some seriously "spicy" food? Well, ignore your first instinct and steer clear of that cup of cold water — it won't help. Instead, reach for a glass of milk, a lemon slice, a spoonful of sugar, or some starchy bread to dilute the painful heat on your tongue.

How To: 15 Clever Uses for Expired Debit, Credit, Gift, and Membership Cards

Do you have a junk drawer full of expired gift cards, membership cards, school ID cards, debit and credit cards, and other sturdy rectangular pieces of plastic you no longer use?

How To: 8 Non-Cooking Uses for Turmeric

Turmeric, the vibrant yellow spice commonly used in Southeast Asian cooking, can also be used outside of the kitchen to disinfect wounds, relieve burns, add an extra golden glow to facial moisturizer, and more.

How To: 9 Non-Toxic DIY Techniques for Killing Weeds in Your Garden

Got pesky weeds in your garden? Rather than stocking up on toxic weed killers from your local gardening store, you probably already have everything you need to kill weeds in your kitchen or living room.

How To: 7 Easy Mnemonic Tricks for Remembering Numbers

Whether it's your credit card, your parents' new zip code, or a new work phone number, number sequences are everywhere. Sometimes it's important to actually remember them instead of always relying on a smartphone or the internet to remind you.

How To: 7 Slick Uses for Castor Oil

If your beloved fern houseplant is looking limp, make a tonic out of 1 tablespoon castor oil, 1 tablespoon baby oil, and 4 cups lukewarm water. Feed your fern with 1 tablespoon of the tonic followed by a normal amount of plain water once a day for several days until your fern starts looking healthy again.

How To: 13 Non-Edible Uses for Bread

The best thing since the creation of bread may just be... sliced bread. Soft bread slices have the perfect absorbent texture for picking up tiny pieces of broken glass, gently cleaning dust off your precious oil paintings, and even safely removing splinters from your finger when soaked with milk and taped to your skin with a bandage.

How To: 18 Awesome Ways to Reuse Old Pantyhose

The annoying thing about pantyhose? They snag and tear very easily. The amazing thing about pantyhose? They have about a gazillion practical uses even if you can no longer wear them.

How To: Build Your Own Kaleidoscope

Are you in dire need of some visual eye candy? Dazzle your eyes by building your own kaleidoscope with a sheet of foldable plastic, common household items and whatever small and sparkly things you can get your hands on.

How To: 10 Unusual Uses for Discarded Eggshells

Many foods do not come in natural packaging that is as useful and versatile as its content. Eggs are an exception. So, the next time you buy a carton of eggs, be sure to hold onto the eggshells after you are finished cooking with them.

How To: Make Brownies in a Mug

For the next time you have a severe chocolate craving but a) don't want to go through the trouble of going through an elaborate recipe and b) don't want to go through the trouble of going to the supermarket, make yourself a microwave brownie in a mug. All you need to do is six very simple ingredients plus water, mix them up in a microwave-safe mug, nuke everything for one minute, and enjoy.

Street Art 101: How to Make a Wheatpaste Poster

Itching to make your own guerrilla-style street art on the side of buildings, freeway overpasses, and abandoned billboards? The beauty of street art is that you don't need an expensive canvas or frame to display your creative expression.

How To: Fold a Chopsticks Rest from Its Paper Wrapper

The next time you go out for sushi with friends, impress your company by fashioning your own chopstick rest using the paper wrapper the wooden chopsticks come in. Keeping the ends of your chopstick off the table surface makes for good hygiene (who knows when was the last time the table was really wiped clean?), and there is no awkward moment of getting your chopsticks off your plate when your server whisks your finished plate away mid-meal. Gotta love functional origami.

The Dried Beans Cheat Sheet: Soaking & Cooking Times for 15 Different Beans

While it may be tempting to rely on canned beans to save time, going through the process of preparing dried beans for cooking can actually be better for you in the long run—for both your physical and financial health.

How To: 11 Weird & Wonderful Uses for Magnets

Other than sticking your crayon drawings onto your refrigerator door, magnets have a variety of unexpected and sometimes surprisingly practical uses, ranging from keeping your chip bags sealed to creating weird patterns on your nail beds using magnetic nail polish.