Disclaimer: I received a Stick Up Camera Solar from Ring as inspiration for this post. All opinions and writing are my own.
It’s finally starting to feel like summer in Colorado and for me that means more time outside, more yard work and more reasons to explore the beautiful outdoors. Whether I’m traveling or just out for a day trip up to the mountains, keeping an eye on things around the house is important, both during the summer and beyond. No matter what adventures the warm weather brings, a few easy precautions can make summer home safety second nature.
Before Drew started full time law enforcement he worked for a major electronics company in Colorado. One of the projects he worked on was the team at Ring, before they brought the Ring doorbell to market. At the time I remember talking about how useful it could be both for families and police departments, now flash forward several years in the future Ring is the leading brand making DIY home security easy and affordable for families.
Keep an eye on the front door
When we moved to our new house one of the first projects I worked on was installing a Ring Doorbell on the front of the house. With Drew’s job requiring odd hours and my perpetual online shopping habit being able to keep an eye on the front door was a priority. I installed the doorbell myself in just a few minutes and the hardest step was finding the right drill bit to go into the brick on the front of the house.
Now when we travel it’s nice to be able to let family and friends know if there is a package on the front porch no matter where in the world we may be.
Install a video security camera
While seeing the front door is a great start to keeping the home secure, adding an additional camera can help with additional peace of mind. Our front door is next to the garage, so anything happening on the left side of the door isn’t visible from the doorbell camera. We live in a nice area so I’m not usually worried about leaving lawn equipment outside in the back yard but it’s nice to have that extra feeling of security.
When Drew’s working and I’m home alone it’s nice to be able to peek out in front of the house if I hear anything unusual. With how the door is located, looking at the driveway or gate requires looking out an upstairs window. If we are traveling, that part of the house isn’t visible at all.
Since I already love our Ring Doorbell the Ring Stick Up Cam Solar was the perfect choice for adding that extra bit of security. Easy to set up, everything we needed to install the camera was in the box, including a drill bit. Battery powered, you can either charge the battery manually every few weeks or attach a Ring Solar Panel to keep charging whenever the sun is shining.
We installed ours on the edge of the garage using a couple of small screws (provided in the kit) and the articulating arm made it easy to adjust the camera to whatever angle would capture the most of the yard. The Stick Up Cam features a wide angle HD Camera and the ability to talk through the camera if anyone enters the yard and sets off the alert. Using the Ring App I can playback video later from my Ring account or see live views of whatever is happening in front of my house.
It’s nice to be able to keep an extra set of eyes on the house no matter how busy the summer gets and I love that Ring is a company that supports law enforcement families. Finding a good home security system is a conversation that comes up in a lot of the Police Wife groups I’m a part of . Being home alone with the family can be scary, especially for those with kids, so knowing whatever service you use is one you can rely on is important. Ring definitely fits those needs for our family.
View the full details about the discount program on the Ring website.
Interested in other products law enforcement families like ours love? Check out my holiday gift guide for police wives.
We moved into the new house just about a month ago and boy has it been a whirlwind. We learned from the old house that big projects like painting and carpet needed to be done as soon as possible otherwise we might end up waiting for years before getting things rolling. Painting the kitchen and bedrooms were the first project we wanted to check off the list to make sure that we had a blank slate to decorate. Our new house came with a bold choice in colors and covering those up allowed us to put a personal touch on the house and feel more like home immediately.
Once the project was done, we needed to get rid of the many buckets of paint left from the previous owners. Leftover paint can be hazardous, especially if its old enough to have lead, so throwing old paint away isn’t an option.
I just recently learned that in 2014 Governor Hickenlooper signed the PaintCare program into action, providing services to collect paint from drop-off sites throughout the state to processing facilities where it can be repurposed. Thanks to PaintCare, there’s no need to keep gallons and gallons of paints around to collect dust because there is nothing else to do with it. Dropping paint to PaintCare completely free, thanks to a fee small added to the sale of paint throughout the state and there are over 150 drop-off sites who accept any brand of paint regardless of where it was originally purchased.
PaintCare Accepted Products
Empty cans are not accepted by PaintCare and can instead be dropped off in regular recycling or disposed of in the trash. Paint cans should be completely empty and any paint inside must be fully dry.
Dropping off paint is easy, and there are over 100 drop off sites throughout Colorado (and several other states). If you have paint you’d like to recycle, you can find a location near you on the PaintCare website location search. Lucky for us, the Sherwin Williams where we bought the new paint is also a drop off location so we could easily drop off all the old bold paint colors at the same time as picking up the new ones. Just like that, its out with the old and in with new!
Now that we are done painting, I’ll store some of the paint for touchups and in case we want to paint any other rooms, but all the extra stuff I’m going to hand off to PaintCare. Why trip over something I don’t need?
What are some of the projects you did when you first moved into your home? How did you prioritize where to start?
Photos courtesy of PaintCare.
When we bought our house, I knew one of the first things I wanted to do was turn the landing nook into a small office. This odd nook in the middle of the hallway seemed like an afterthought by the builder [or a creative way of adding useless square footage]. The entire space is approximately 5′ x 5′ so finding the right things to make the office feel both useful and comfortable was a challenge.
Starting with the furniture, I needed space that would allow me to keep a wide variety of things at hands reach, without taking up too much space. For a desk, the Ikea LINNMON table ended up as the perfect fit. Paired with a 4 square KALLAX I had enough storage space to keep everything I wanted near by. While functional, I didn’t really love the space and even though it works, I still would take my laptop over to a coffee shop or the library to focus and get work done.
As my own personal Valentine’s Day challenge, I wanted to see what I could do to take a functional space, and make it into one that I LOVE to work in. Continue Reading…
As you get ready for the busy holiday season, now is the perfect time to do a deep clean of your house before decorations go up and guests start to arrive.
Our house is a tri-level, meaning that each room is broken up into smaller spaces but the connecting open floor plan makes everything feel bigger. During the holidays, we need to be creative to add the tree and holiday decorations into the living room without making the room feel cluttered. Continue Reading…
