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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: 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.
How To: 8 Home Remedies That'll Get Rid of Those Dark Circles Under Your Eyes
If people are constantly asking you why you look so tired, then maybe it's time to get rid of the puffy dark circles under your eyes.
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.
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: 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: 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: 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 DIY Ways to Remove Sweat Stains from Clothes
Got a bad sweat stain on the underarms of your light-colored clothing? You probably have something in your kitchen or medicine cabinet that will help get rid of the stain immediately. Aspirin, table salt, lemon juice, white vinegar, baking soda, and even meat tenderizer (make sure it is unseasoned!) are some of the many common household ingredients you can use to make your sweaty clothes look brand new again.
How To: Send a Secret Message Inside an Egg
Whether it's for Valentine's Day or you simply want to send a note to someone in a unique way, a secret message inside of a seemingly untouched raw egg is the perfect way to go.
How To: 21 Cool Ways to Use a Paper Clip
A single paper clip can go a long way. Having just one of these ubiquitous office supplies can make you a smartphone mount, replace your broken zipper tab, scratch your lottery ticket, and eject the CD from your stuck DVD drive.
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: 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.
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: 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: Unshrink Jeans & Other Clothes That Shrunk in the Dryer
Is your cotton tank top or beloved pair of jeans feeling a bit tighter than usual? If you need to un-shrink an article of clothing that has been left in the dryer for too long, then you can use baby shampoo, hair conditioner, or simply water to gently stretch and pull the fabric back into its original shape.
How To: 11 Easy DIY Techniques for Opening a Super-Tight Jar
Have a hard-to-open jar? If it's never been opened, the air pressure inside the jar is making it harder to break the seal. If it's been in the fridge, it's possible that the lid shrunk slightly—just enough to be extremely frustrating.
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.
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.
Winter Warmth: How to Make a Cheap Microwavable Heat Pack Using a Sock & Dry Beans
Using dry beans and and some scraps of cotton fabric, you can make your own DIY microwavable heat pack which can be used to relieve sore muscles, warm your hands when stepping outside into cold weather, heating up your pillow case on a freezing night, and more.
How To: 5 DIY Methods for Unclogging a Clogged Toilet Without a Plunger
Got a clogged toilet on your hands? Before you call the plumber or bust out the plunger, try one of the five DIY methods listed below, all of them incorporating common tools or ingredients easily found in your closet, kitchen or medicine cabinet.
How To: Turn a Plastic Garbage Bag into a High-Flying DIY Kite
Where one sees plastic garbage bags, I see living creatures soaring high in the windy skies—and you can too. The choice is completely yours. But, wouldn't it be nice to spare one trash bag the indignity of holding waste?
How To: 11 Practical to Crafty Uses for Empty Pringles Cans (Or Just More Excuses to Eat Lots of Potato Chips)
If you've recently binged out on a can or two of Pringles potato chips, don't throw away those empty containers just yet. After cleaning the insides, you can transform your cylindrical chip canisters into uncooked spaghetti noodles holders, kaleidoscopes, pinhole cameras, sugar shakers, and even hot dog cookers.
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: 14 Weirdly Useful (And Non-Drinkable) Uses for Soda Pop
If you just gave up drinking soda and you don't know what to do with the six-pack of Coke gathering dust in your garage, then this article is perfect for you. The acidity, sugar content and carbonated nature of most soda drinks are perfect for a number of surprisingly practical uses for DIY home projects, garden work, kitchen cleanup, car maintenance, cooking and more.
How To: Build Your Own Terrarium
Do you have a green thumb but an extremely limited living space? Try building your own DIY terrarium. All you need is a clear glass or plastic container, a few of your favorite plants, and some cheap gardening supplies to start your own self-contained, self-sustained miniature garden.
How To: Your DIY Bug Repellent Guide to Common Household Pests
Contrary to popular belief, eliminating household pests from your home can be accomplished without completely bombing your living space with a mess of toxic fumes. Whether you have annoying fruit flies in the kitchen, fleas on your beloved pet or silverfish lurking around your bathroom, it is very likely that a DIY, non-toxic and super inexpensive solution exists for your household bug problem.
How To: 9 DIY Home Remedies for Relieving Itchy Mosquito Bites
There are few things peskier in the summer than an unexpected mosquito bite swelling up on your arms and legs. Fortunately, there are many ways to heal your body of its annoying itch, ranging from fruit (lemon slices and banana peels) to common household items (baking soda and apple cider vinegar).
How To: Find the Best Sunglasses for Your Face Shape
With summer officially starting in less than two weeks, now might be a good time to brush up on your sunglasses game. Specifically, what is the best style of sunglasses for your unique face shape?
How To: Prepare an Emergency Survival Kit for Earthquakes & Other Natural Disasters
Have you ever put together a basic survival kit for your home in case of an earthquake or natural disaster? If not, you should, because you'll want to be prepared should the worst happen.
How To: 13 More Awesome Household Cleaning Hacks
Pretty much all of your cleaning supplies can be found in your kitchen or medicine cabinet for dirt cheap. White vinegar can be used to clean shower head deposits and your dishwasher on an empty cycle. Ammonia can be used to clean the gunk off your stove burner grates. And citrus fruits can be used to clean bathtub rings and dull sink faucets.
How To: 9 Home Remedies for Treating Eczema
Eczema, which affects about 35 million adults living in the United States, is a chronic allergic condition in which the skin develops extremely itchy, scaly rashes and most commonly occurs on the face, scalp, inside of elbows, knees, ankles and hands.
Stop Wasting Water: 15 Ways to Conserve More Water During a Drought
If you are living in California, you have probably already heard by now that the state is in a severe drought of unprecedented levels. Even if you don't live in a drought-affected area, it is extremely vital for everybody on this planet to conserve water as much as possible.
How To: 11 Delicious Culinary Uses for Muffin Tins Besides Just Cupcakes & Muffins
Using a metal or silicone muffin tin, you can bake, freeze, or whip up a wide variety of snacks, appetizers, and desserts that aren't just cupcakes and muffins.
How To: 8 Things You Can Use Shaving Cream For Besides Shaving
If you want to prevent your bathroom mirror from fogging up in the morning, simply rub shaving cream all over the surface before hopping into the shower.
Acupressure 101: Relieve Mental & Physical Stress Using These Acupoints
The next time you're feeling tired and stressed out, pull down on your earlobes firmly for a few seconds, or apply firm pressure to the indentation on your nose bridge between your eyebrows using your thumb for several minutes while breathing deeply. Sometimes a little acupressure is all you need to give an extra lift to your mental and physical health.
How To: Make Homemade Ice Cream Using Empty Coffee Cans
If you've got a couple empty coffee cans getting ready to go out to the recycling—don't get rid of them just yet. Instead, use them to make your own homemade ice cream. It's the perfect DIY treat as the weather gets warmer in anticipation of the summer season.
How To: 15 Ways to Reuse Old CD Spindle Cases
Compact discs...remember those? Before you toss your old CD spindle cases away, consider upcycling them to a DIY terrarium, cable storage container, hamster toy, rainfall shower head, bird feeder, bagel sandwich lunch box, and more.