Spring and summer are upon us and it is time to get your home ready for warmer weather and lounging around outside.

The Lawhead Team would like to share some helpful tips to getting your home summer ready:

Rejuvenate your outdoor space. Make sure all barbeque related equipment is in working order. In order to do that, make sure your propane tank is full or you have enough charcoal and lighter fluid, and clean your barbeque. Clean up your outdoor entertaining area – make sure to scrub your deck thoroughly, wash outdoor furniture and pillows along with umbrellas. Though these usually get ignored, the outdoor light fixtures are a good idea to clean before summer is here.

Change your air filter for your air conditioner. On days you cannot manage without the AC, it is important to make sure you are getting the proper clean air flow from your filter. If you can handle life without the AC, open the windows and let air flow through the house. Did you know you can add plants to your home to help purify the air? Snake plants, spider plant, English ivy and small leafed rubber plants work great indoors to help improve air quality.

Replace winter items for cooler, lighter summery items. Your flannel sheets can be taken off and replaced with warm weather summer linens. Take some time to go through your winter wardrobe and donate anything you didn’t wear this winter.

Keep energy costs down. Save energy by blocking out sunlight with curtains or blinds. This will reduce the amount of heat entering your home. Make sure your hoses are not leaking…water is expensive! Since it is warm out, you can dry your clothes outside during the summer. This makes them smell lovely and saves on costs for using your dryer.

Do you have any summer time suggestions?  Please share with us on our blog!

Memorial Day is a great time to enjoy your backyard and grill up some burgers while enjoying our freedom!

Check out some facts about Memorial Day along with some festive ideas for what to do on this enjoyable 3 Day Weekend!

For many of us, Memorial Day is a three day holiday to celebrate what feels like the beginning of summer. That’s good, because there is a lot to be said for celebrating the start of those hopefully lazy, hazy, crazy days of summer with a cookout, picnic, barbecue or gathering of friends and family.

But like many other national holidays, there’s a meaningful back story that’s worth telling and remembering in some way during this celebration, and you’ll find lots of ideas on just how to integrate remembering into your day below.  But first, what’s Memorial Day about?

How did Memorial Day begin? Apparently, many towns and cities claim to have started the tradition of Decoration Day, as Memorial Day was originally called, although Waterloo NY was declared the winner of this title by former President Lyndon Johnson in May, 1966. The day itself actually was proclaimed by a Union General on May 5, 1868 to honor those who had died in the Civil War by placing flowers on their graves on May 30 at Arlington National Cemetery.  After World War I, the day was changed to celebrate those U.S. forces who had fought and died in any war. In 1971 it was declared a national holiday to be celebrated on the last Monday of May. Since then, it has been a day meant for a unified honoring of the nation’s war veterans who died in war. It’s been informally expanded to include those who are veterans who died after serving in the US. armed forces as well.

Remember those who gave….Traditionally, it’s a day of cook outs, picnics, and outdoor activities, but here are a few ideas on how to add more meaning to your Memorial Day this year:

• Attend a parade: Many local communities have a small parade honoring veterans who have fought in a war or contributed to the effort in some way. Regardless of your politics and beliefs, it’s a way to give tribute to those have done what they felt was right for their country. Thank them.

• Visit a cemetery: This can be especially important if one of your relatives was a veteran. While the tradition over the early years of Memorial Day was to “decorate” the grave with flowers, you’ll most often today see the small flags next to the tombstones of veterans (usually placed there by volunteers), whether they died in the war or later. Children can benefit from this activity as well, because it gives them a history lesson.

• Have a family ceremony: During your event, take a few moments to say a word about your family members who may have fought, died, been wounded or disabled in any war for the U.S. If you’ve done some work on your family tree, go back as far as you can. If you have a family member or friend who is in or returning from Afghanistan, ask them to speak, and give them your thanks.

• Create a playlist of relevant Memorial Day music: With i-tunes and your i-pod, you can design a playlist of patriotic music in any genre from country to big bands. The old standards like America the Beautiful are always good, but be creative and do a mix of pop, rock, R & B and country  Add the music that is meaningful for you from various times the country was at war. Here are a few starter ideas for your list:

• America (Neil Diamond)
• Freedom (Paul McCartney)
• Citizen Soldier (3 Doors Down)
• Living in America (James Brown)
• Born in the USA (Bruce Springsteen)
• R.O.C.K. in the USA (John Mellencamp)
• American Soldier (Toby Keith)
• It’s America (Rodney Adkins)

• Wear a red poppy: This tradition began in 1915 when Moina Michael wrote her own poem in reaction to In Flanders Fields, mentioning a red poppy in relation to the “blood of heroes never dies”. Since then organizations, including veterans groups, have made the red poppies to sell for fund raising purposes.

• Have a Remembrance Moment: In hopes of putting the remembering back in Memorial Day, Congress declared in 2000 a National Moment of Remembrance resolution. At 3pm local time, Americans are asked to “voluntarily and informally observe in their own way a moment of remembrance and respect, pausing from whatever they are doing for a moment of silence or listening to Taps.”

• Serve a “flag cake”: After all the remembering activities, move on to your summer start off celebration with menu that includes a “flag cake”. Vanilla cake, vanilla frosting strawberries cut in quarters and some blueberries are all you need. Bake the cake in a 9 x 13 pan, frost it, then create a flag design using the strawberries for stripes and  the blueberries for the stars. Yummy, patriotic, and another way to remember what Memorial Day is all about!

Springtime is here and it is time to get your backyard looking its best!  Barbeques, horseshoes, and backyard parties are all a reason to get your backyard looking its best this season.

If you are a fish lover, and want to add some life to your backyard, you may want to think about getting a Koi Pond put in your back yard. While they are expensive, if you have the funds they look absolutely amazing, not only that, they can be customized to fit the entire look of your back yard.

Another great home improvement for your backyard, would be putting in a concrete area and building a fire pit. If you are someone that likes to cook on the grill, then this would be a great way to host parties and stuff.

One type of backyard home improvement for homes that are on the water are tiki huts. Tiki huts give your back yard a great tropical feel and it goes without saying that if you have a tiki hut, then you must have a bar there. If you want to take it a step further, you can install some outdoor HD televisions inside of your tiki hut.  However be mindful that these types of televisions are more expensive than normal ones, but they are made to withstand certain weather conditions, and the sea salt, if you happen to live on saltwater.

Of course you can also do the popular types of home improvements, such as building a shed, remodeling or installing a swimming pool, planting palm trees, building a playground, putting in a sand box, or anything that you heart desires.

If you have kids and want to get them into sports, and have the room, why not modify your backyard for the certain sport that they like. For instance putting in a basketball court is not as hard and expensive as one may think, with the right planning and budget, it can be done for a little over a thousand dollars, depending on many factors of course, as you may need to have a concrete truck show up at your home once you get the foundation in tact.

Another idea that you may want to consider is building a treehouse for your kids. If you kids are around the age that they are in Kindergarden they will absolutely love it. That is something that they will enjoy throughout the years probably all the way up to when they are in high school. The way you might have to go about getting a tree fort made would be to go through a professional handyman or carpenter that has lots of experience building structures, as tree forts are usually do not come out of the box with assembly instructions.

If you are feeling really frisky, you could even build a small guest house in your backyard.  These are just a couple of ideas that you could do for backyard home improvements, so let your imagination run wild, and see what you can come up with.