hobbies

How to Clean a Dirty Aquarium

by The Organizer Lady dot com on July 6, 2010

How to Clean a Dirty Aquarium

A fresh water fish tank requires about 30 minutes to an hour of work a week depending on the size of the tank.

What you will need:
1. You will need a clean 5 gallon bucket that has never had chemicals or soap inside of it.
2. A hose or gravel cleaner
3. A bag of natural or synthetic sea salt

I have split the work into two parts the tank which needs to be cleaned ever week on the same day and the filters which can be cleaned every 2 or 3 weeks.

The very first thing you have to do before you start cleaning your fish tank is to unplug your tanks heater if you have one. The heater can not be allowed to be removed from the water while it is hot so make sure to leave it unplugged at least 20 minutes before attempting to remove it. The water help cool the glass on the heater if removed it could crack, or the glass could totally shatter. You should also remember to never stick your hand inside of any fish tank before making sure the heater is not only off but unplugged from the wall. A small crack in the heater could be more then enough to cause a shock to you that can be fatal.

After the heater has ha time to cool you can safely remove the heater from the tank or it the heater is submersible you can just push it down to the bottom of the tank.

Now take any decorations you may have placed in the tank, so all you have are the small gravel at the bottom, this will allow you to get any dirt that those decorations may have been covering up. Now if you do not have a gravel cleaner you are going to have to roll up your sleeves and get your hands wet. You will need to stir up the gravel to get the dirt that has settled between the gravel into the water, and start removing the water into the bucket with the hose. Do not throw out the water you will still need it to clean the filters.

If you have a gravel cleaner, push the plastic tube into the gravel until it hits the bottom of the tank, then start a siphon into the bucket, every second or 2 move the gravel cleaner over an inch or 2 and repeat this process until either you have removed 15 percent of the tanks water of you have cleaned all the gravel.

Now at this point you can clean the Aquariums filters. The insides of the filters are used to grow bacteria, that help break down the nitrites and nitrates that are in the water from fish waste and uneaten food. To make sure we don’t kill all these Aquarium friendly bacteria, we clean the filter materials and sponges in the dirty water that I also full of the bacteria. Take everything out of the filters and rinse them of in the bucket of dirty Aquarium water, then give the sponge a couple of squeezes in the bucket and reassemble the filters, and put them back on the tank.

Now before adding the water sea salt must be added to the tank. All water has some amount of salt in it and to replicate the natural habitat of the fish there must be salt in your tank as well. Add approximately 1 cup of sea salt for every 50 gallons of water.

Now you can add water to the tank, but you must make sure the water is the within a degree or two of the temperature of the water in the tank. A drastic change in the tanks temperature suddenly can throw the fish into shock and kill them or weaken their immunity and help give them a fish disease. I recommend filling the bucket with hot water and checking it regularly till it is the same as the tanks temperature, then slowly add the water to the tank, start the filters and the heater.

Cleaning the filters only needs to be done once or twice a month, but the water in the tank must be cleaned on the same day every week.

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Get Organized: Making Room for Your Hobbies

by The Organizer Lady dot com on April 13, 2010

Get Organized: Making Room for Your Hobbies

Everyone has something that interests them. Some people are into model cars; others collect coins, stamps, comic books or trading cards; and others are scrapbook, rubber stamping or crocheting enthusiasts. Whatever your personal hobby of choice is, it is important to have an area in your home that is dedicated to that is interest. This space can be as large or small as you see fit, and obviously, what you need within that space entirely depends on what it is you are planning to do there.

This space is yours. You may feel free to clutter it up in the course of your pursuits. In fact, do not worry about keeping it neat while you are actually working on your hobbies. Your concentration should be on the things that interest you, not on keeping this area organized. Otherwise, you may find yourself unable to actually get anything done for fear of making a bit of a mess.

Now, here is the trick. Clutter up you hobby area all you like, but clean it up when you are done using it. Many areas that were once dedicated to someone’s hobby have fallen into chaos and ended up as a glorified storage area because no one bothered to clean it up when they were done using it. This should not be a difficult process, as long as you have set up storage within your space where your various supplies and such can be kept. This is something to consider when you are putting your space together. A few dollars worth of plastic bins may be all you will need to keep your area organized. You will find that a few minutes of organization when you are done using your area will allow you the most possible freedom the next time you use it again.

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Organizing Your Craft and Sewing Supplies

by The Organizer Lady dot com on March 1, 2009

By Rachel Paxton

If you’re a weekend crafter like me, you probably have a lot of crafting odds and ends laying around that get all jumbled together depending on what project you’re working on at the moment.

Over the years, I have found several ways to organize my craft and sewing supplies in a way that I can actually find them again when I need them. As I went through the process of organizing them, I was able to identify items I no longer needed and separate the remaining items into logical groups. As a result, I now have all my supplies limited to one corner of a room and well organized. Now I can find things when I need them.

When I first started sorting through all my supplies everything was thrown together in a lot of cardboard boxes up in a hard-to-reach closet. The first thing I did was dump each box into a big pile and start sorting. My piles were: lace, trim, buttons, quilting supplies, cross stitch supplies, ribbon roses, fabric scraps, craft books, and misc.

I first discarded the odds and ends I knew I’d never use again. I then bought two very large Rubbermaid containers (great for stacking) to store my supplies in. You may need more depending on how many supplies you have accumulated. I also bought some gallon-sized Ziploc bags.

I sorted through all the lace and trim and put lace in one Ziploc bag and trim in another. The ribbon roses went in another. I put all the buttons in a plastic container with different compartments–sorted by color. All these items, plus other misc. like styrofoam balls, contact paper, plastic canvas, went into one Rubbermaid container.

All my quilting and cross stitch supplies (mostly fabric scraps and cross stitch fabric) went into the second container.

All my unfinished projects went into a cardboard box, and all my yarn for plastic canvas projects went into another.

The containers and boxes stack on top of each other and fit nicely underneath a small square “craft table” I have set up in the corner of my home office. It’s all out of the way and everything is easily identified.

On top of the table I keep little projects I’m working on, like cross stitch, or photo albums for working on scrapbooks. My embroidery thread is organized by DMC number in plastic containers made for storing embroidery thread. These containers are also stacked on the table.

My sewing machine thread is organized on a small wooden board with small spindles you can buy that is designed to hold spools of thread. My sewing machine sits on the floor next to the craft table while not in use.

Next to my craft table is a stand-alone cupboard that is sold as a pantry cupboard that you can probably find at Walmart for about $100. In the cupboard I store a lot of multipurpose items like my glue guns, all kinds of glue, paper, scissors, and all of my scrapbooking supplies. This cupboard works great for items other family members also use a lot, like tape and scissors. My paper cutter and long stapler are stored on top of the cabinet.

I also have several bookcases in my office, and I use a couple of shelves on one of them for organizing my craft and sewing books. The books are organized by craft type.

All of my small sewing supplies I keep in a couple of small sewing baskets that I can move with me from room to room. In these I keep sewing needles, embroidery scissors, measuring tape, pins, seam ripper, etc.

Hopefully these ideas will help you get in the mood to start organizing your own craft and sewing supplies. It’s so much more enjoyable to work on projects when you know what you have and where everything is.

About the author:
Rachel Paxton is a freelance writer and mom who is the author of What’s for Dinner?, an e-cookbook containing more than 250 quick easy dinner ideas. For more recipes, gardening, organizing tips, home decorating, holiday hints, and more, visit Creative Homemaking at www.creativehomemaking.com.