VIRGINIA BEACH The neighborhood children cheered as the goldfish in Roy Balaconis' pond proved their resilience and emerged from under a group of rocks after winter's end this year.

Pick me! Pick me! Pick me! That was my reaction when Home's editor asked me to do a cover story on achieving the perfect paint job.
With spring in the air, thoughts turn to sprucing up the homestead without spending a ton of cash - and painting's an easy way to get a different look without breaking the bank.

VIRGINIA BEACH Lucinda Fury knew she had a problem when the AquaTile walls surrounding her shower and tub began to bubble and stain less than two years after the bathroom's renovation. Her son, Chris Fury, who had helped Fury's boyfriend, Rich Knebel, with the original do-it-yourself makeover, rolled up his sleeves once again and tore down the tub's walls to see what was amiss.

By Betsy DiJulio
January is a time for new beginnings and fresh starts. So I considered and dismissed a number of "get organized" options for this month's project.
But, still feeling caught up in the spirit of holiday giving, an idea from Saveur magazine's "The Saveur 100" won out.

VIRGINIA BEACH
Bill and Linda Greaves started literally from the bottom up.
The Brighton on the Bay couple decided to redo their kitchen while keeping the room's existing ceramic tiles.
Easy? Think again.
Finding make-over pieces like granite and back splashes in white and black to match the 22-year-old floor was next to impossible. Brown and green would have been another story.

By Betsy DiJulio IN THIS SEASON of thanks and abundance, it's my pleasure to offer a "two-fer" for November.

VIRGINIA BEACH For years, Molly Brown fantasized about turning her “old, damp and yucky” master bathroom into a haven of any sort. But a renovation would be costly and Brown, 38, a mother of two young boys and director at a local homeless shelter, hardly had the resources to support her vision. Life in the bathroom of this little corner of Green Run would remain unremarkable.

CHESAPEAKE
Warm beer wouldn't suffice. Yet with all she had to manage - family, household and her job as a dental hygienist - Ann Emsley sometimes dropped the ball in the "have-a-beer-on-ice-for-my husband" department.
Emsley's creative solution gave her something to boast about, and fattened her wallet by $1,000, after she entered The Virginian-Pilot's Do-It-Yourself Contest.

AMERICAN PATRIOT and kite-flying electrician Benjamin Franklin must have known something when he said, "An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure."
The same is true today when it comes to putting a little time and money into your home to keep ahead of big breakdowns and big bucks to pay for big-ticket repairs that could have been prevented with an ounce of maintenance.

Sometimes magic carpet rides fall to earth. Beautiful, patterned Oriental rugs, even expensive, high-quality ones from the far reaches of the globe, have accidents.

Bound edges come undone from wear or mishap.

Furniture and foot traffic wear down their pile.

Fringe gets caught in doors, tangled in vacuum cleaners, gnawed by four-legged friends.