courses offered

"Staging the Interior of your Home for Resale" Course Description

“You only have once chance to make a first, good impression”. This

applies to all aspects of life but it is HUGE in the real estate world.

If you’ve watched even one episode of the many buy/sell shows on

TV, you’ve seen someone literally stop considering a house after

seeing a RED wall (paint), a messy closet (edit/tidy) or a past-its-glory

kitchen (small updates). If you want to sell your house quickly, and

get what you are asking, there are lists of MUST DO’s, both inside

and out. This course addresses the interior, the small but very

important details such as de-cluttering, cleaning and editing. Create

the ‘illusion’ your home is MORE than what they see; it’s possible,

you need only learn how. Note: There are two other courses available

(de-cluttering and home re-design) that may further benefit you in

selling your house.

Louis Riel School Division

Louis Riel Arts & Technology Centre

5 de Bourmont Ave

Ph: (204) 237-8951

For Info & on line Registration, go to

CLASSES FOR 2012

Redecorating your Home; In Style and on Budget

3 Tuesdays, Jan 17-31st, 6:30-9PM

Staging the Interior of your House for Resale

1 Tuesday, February 7th, 6:30-9PM

Garden Design 101: Turn your Backyard into an

'Urban Oasis'

4 Tues, Feb 28-Mar 20, 6:30-9PM

Redecorating your Home; In Style and on Budget

3 Tuesdays, April 10-24, 6:30-9PM

Staging the Interior of your House for Resale

1 Tuesday, May 1st, 6:30-9PM

Nature's Way; a Guide to Organic Gardening

2 Tuesdays, May 8-15th, 6:30-9PM

Garden Design 101: Turn your Backyard into an

'Urban Oasis'

4 Tuesdays, May 22-June 12th, 6:30-9PM

Garden Design 101: Turn your Back Yard into

an ‘Urban Oasis’ Course Description

More of us are turning to our own homes and yards

to provide us with space to relax, de-stress and

entertain. That trip to the lake gets longer each year

and the bungalow, or condo you just downsized to is

the perfect space to create something unique and

nurturing. This course explains microclimates and

how to best utilize your light and soil conditions. As

well, it explains the basic design concepts so

whatever you have to work with, big or small,

bright or shady, wet or dry or all of the above,

you can maximize your yard, minimize the

maintenance and learn the joy of expanding your

living space to the outdoors without driving

anywhere.

St. James- Assiniboia S.D.

John Taylor Collegiate

Ph: (204) 832-9637

For Info & on line Registration, go to

www.inquiries@sjsd.net

Putting Your Garden to Bed

Decluttering; Organization for the

Hopelessly Disorganized, Room 106

2 Wednesdays, beginning Jan 11, 7-9pm

CLASSES FOR 2012

Declutter your home and your life:

Start Fresh!

2 Wednesdays, Feb. 22 & 29, 6:30- 9PM

Staging the Interior of Your Home for Resale

2 Wednesdays, March 7 & 14, 6:30- 9PM

Redecorating your Home; In Style and on Budget

3 Wednesdays, Apr 11-May, 6:30-9PM

No classes on April 16th

Nature's Way: a Guide to Organic Gardening

2 Wednesdays, May 9 & 15, 6:30-9PM

Garden Design 101: Turn your Backyard into an

'Urban Oasis'

4 Wednesdays, May 23-June 13, 6:30-9PM

Autumn, 2011 and who knew; from crazy wind and rain in 2010, to drought and "will it EVER rain" summers of '12, there's been a lot more paving going on both here and in

other yards. Shrubs are a new fave and drought hardy perennials get to stay...too much work! Now, with the casual, recycled stone pavement, the yard connects from the

front and back entry and everywhere else throughout the garden; great flow and inexpensive and quick. The house reno was a horrific experience but Nature prevailed and

put me on a new track. Work with what you can't change! Another suggestion I will offer up is 'when it's time to give up, do so' but not on the project - just on the project's completion date. It's November 4th, and I am watering my garden, and tomorrow I will be trenching in whatever still isn't planted because once again, I have run

out of weather and I come last. There is always next year and leaving things to be done gives you someothing to look forward to and plan, and replan during the winter

months until spring arrives and we begin, like life in the garden, again. That said, for a billion reasons, gardens and plants change as does the weather and therefore change

is a constant, so learn to enjoy it - it's always an adventure!

Trees, shrubs and perennials: develop a low maintenance, low water requirement garden that works for you and not vice versa. Known as woody perennials and unlike most perennial flowers,

most shrubs don’t require much but an occasional prune and a good feed twice a year, and some will flower for months, like the woody hydrangeas. If your garden is 1/3-1/2 woody perennials,

and 1/3 left to access pathways, using a lesser amount of perennial/annual plants, a little tasteful art and some space between the plants, it will not only be user friendly, but it will cost you a lot less time,

money and effort in the process.

"Recorating your home; on Time and on Budget" Course Description

Whether your home is a new build lacking personality, an older home you’re

considering renovating or perhaps you are just in, or moving to a condo and downsizing;

this course will show you how to maximize the finer architectural aspects of the space.

With organizational tips and ideas on how to ‘fool the eye’ (your own or someone

else’s) into NOT even noticing areas of your home you find less than appealing, but

cannot change. Your home can become the place you’d be inclined to purchase if

looking without packing and moving into someone else’s money pit. Moving out or

staying put, the principles are very similar and not as difficult as you may think. There

is a de-cluttering course available for those of you not able to get to the redesign

place because you can’t find the floor.

Renovations

As summer wanes, our thoughts about what's inside aren't always good ones. A kitchen renovation isn't cheap. Will your renovation pay you back when it comes

to re-sale? Fortunately, kitchens are one of the best investments. According to surveys, a kitchen reno gives you one of the best return on interest (ROI). So you

may spend $12-$15,000 or much more, depending on your budget, the approximate return is 75-100%; that's still a LOT of money. Bathroom renos are another

good investment; spend $5,000 and the return is about 75-100% . The biggest return is when you add a main floor bath; invest under $5,000 and recoup 80-100%.

There are many renos and DIY projects which give good returns. The top "DIY" reno, for well under $5,000 is simply replacing knobs and hardware We can't just

up and renovate our homes without putting a lot of thought into it but what we can do is make the best of a bad to not so great situation until such time as a 'full

or partial' renovation is possible. Believe me, what you originally THINK you want, and what you finally end up doing have little in common other than the same

space. Our funky, if undesired linoleum got us through several transitions and the upper, 1942 cabinetry is still in the kitchen today; that was not a PLAN but

more a realization that messing with them meant messing with wiring, walls and ceiling and taking our $7000-$10,000 budget to a whole other level. We couldn't

go there so we worked with what we had and, ulitimately, love the character of the kitchen still being there, working with the rest of the house, AND staying well

within our budget. That budget let us re-do the floors in the kitchen, dining room, foyer, front porch and upstairs 2 powder room so it really stretched. It took us

16 years to get from 'the beginning' to where we feel comfortable in saying "it's done". There are advantages of taking your time and it isn't always monetary;

sometimes you find as you grow with your house, you see it differently, your needs change and what you get, if not rushing, is what works best on so many levels.

Trust that little voice in your head that says "wouldn't it be interesting if.." and then do it. Duane Michals.

Don't feel compelled to stay in a single 'style' of decor; the more outside of the box you allow yourself to delve into, the more interesting your space

becomes as well as it allows you to introduce new, eclectic and less traditional pieces to the room making it less stagnant and allowing your tastes to

change without distrupting the flow of the house. Individualism is a wonderful thing and it allows your home to speak of you and not some magazine you

flipped through, just as thousands of others have; "borrow" ideas, just don't try to duplicate them - you'll be happier in the end. It's not about reinventing

the wheel, it's about finding another use other than pulling a wagon.

"Life Long Learning" in cooperation with the

Winnipeg School Division" 2012

Grant Park High School

450 Nathaniel St.

For Info & on line Registration, go to

http://lifelonglearning.wsd1.org

Staging the Interior of Your Home for Resale

1 Thursday, May 31, 6–8:30 PM, Room 7

Nature's Way; a Guide to Organic Gardening

2 Thursdays, May 10 and 17th, 6-8:30 PM

Room 7

Garden Design 101: Turn your Backyard into an

'Urban Oasis'

4 Thurs, April 12 – May 3, 6-8:30PM, Room 7

Butterfly Gardens; How to Attract Beneficial

Insects to your Garden

Thursday, May 24, 6-8:30 PM, Room 7

The Art of Redesign: redefine your home,

one room at a time

Garden Design 101: Turn your Backyard into an

'Urban Oasis'

We loved the old concrete so a new sidewalk was NOT going to happen; that said broken slabs, new and old, miscellaneous

bricks & stones from other projects were used so now there is

continuity from the NE side of the house, between the side walkway , and the back patio and courtyard. It's far more interesting, took little time and is in keeping with the age of the house (left).

Most stonework was placed right on top of existing wood mulch;

it has a less rigid feel and seldom needs 'readjusting' in spring.

Clutter robs people of precious time and energy that cannot be replaced and we waste hundreds of hours a year looking for misplaced items.

Getting rid of excess clutter eliminates approximately 40% of housework. Defeat chaos and take back your home, while developing some basic

interior \design techniques to assist you in redecorating your newly discovered space, now functional, balanced and added value and

beauty to your home.

Left; this room edit involved little more than paint, 2X4construction (still not painted),

inexpensive dowls for rods and organization of clothing, coordinated by color. The two windows

are a bonus from this once upon a time, 2nd floor apartment kitchen, NOW a walk-in closet but

the walls are still cardboard, the wonderful

storage bench was a $20 Kijiji find and most

of the hanging storage units come from 2nd hand stores for under $3. Shoe boxes on sale at

Canadian Tire for under $20 and there's almost

20 of them. It's not what you spend but how

you utilize and space and manipulate the budget; yes, there always MUST be a budget. I'm still

editing the clothes but one thing at a time.

The idea here is NOT to go out and buy all things new but to try shopping in your own home by going through your own stuff, after an edit,

and rethink how it will work in your refreshed, redesigned and redecorated space. A major dusting will force an edit on me, and with that, a

new look. It drives my husband crazy so when the ladder comes out and I'm dusting on top of the armoire, he hightails it out of the house, knowing it will be 'brand new' when he gets home. A coat of paint, paintable wallpaper over top of "bad decision" wall paper and then paint;

the fix was under $100 and the change in size of space (illusion) and brightness was incredible!

"Declutter your Space and Start your Life Fresh" Course Description

This course will explain how, by taking tiny, baby steps, you can work towards an end goal that can be changed every time

you reach a milestone. Discover why your insurmountable pile of stuff is keeping you from being able to enjoy your home,

your life, even find peace of mind and then, set yourself on a path to order. It’s not about how quickly you get it done; if

you take on too much, you set yourself up for disappointment. Learn from an organizer where to start, how to keep going,

what to do with it afterwards, and best of all, how wonderful it feels when even a small space in your life becomes a stress

free zone – one space at a time. If you’ve managed to get past the major portion of editing your stuff down to a reasonable, justifiable size, perhaps the course on how to “redecorate” your home with what’s left and a new “look”, that course is

available.

DECLUTTERING and how to make it "work" for you, one space at a time.

This oddly shaped room, originally designed to be two spaces, was figured out. Again, over a very extended lenght of time, and one in between paint

job, the former (left) became the latter and the space went from dark, dingy and cold to warm, open and inviting. The best part of the final stages of the

room were that, in order to repaint, everything had to be moved to another ROOM while that room was being painted, wait until it dried, then on to the

next. A forced edit suggested all nail holes, anything relating to past decor be repaired and painted over and once it was time to put it all back, there was

a HUGE amount of stuff that would only create clutter; I was over that phase of my life regardless of how good I may have been at it. Minimalist I will never

be but now my two storage areas that house the 'stuff' I still really like allow me to change up the room(s) whenever a major 'dust' is in the works. I get

to reinvent the rooms without doing more than rearrange, take things from storage and put others in, and in the end I've got a new space and it cost me

absolutely NOTHING but time; a good time I might add!

This is American Bittersweet, a vine I do

not recommend anyone plant unless planted

in a container in the ground. It roots

everywhere as I can attest. I just keep cutting

it off at the ground; it's too late for me.

That said, 90% of next years growth will be from new wood and I am left with

this funky entanglement which I leave,

dead or otherwise. Clematis now ses

THIS natural trellis and is lovely. Meanwhile, all year, sometimes 20 or more sparrows can be seen outside the kitchen

window, singing and sunning themselves.

In that regard, sometimes mistakes work out and this is one such perfect error!

"NATURE’S WAY: A guide to Organic Gardening and No, it’s NOT just about Vegetables"

COURSE DESCRIPTION

By incorporating native perennials and grasses into the home landscape, organic gardeners can find alternatives

to a traditional lawn; these options are great for people who want their yards to attract more birds, butterflies,

and other wildlife. This will, in turn, create a lower maintenance, more earth friendly space. Prairie hardy

perennials and grasses are regal and the subtle hues of the grasses naturally complement the flowers vivid colors. Vegetables, perennials and shrubs will thrive using only no-chemical fertilizers and soil amendments with as little supplemental watering because they were chosen to work with your garden’s specific microclimates. You will

install a community of plants that evolved together for thousands of years, putting Xeriscaping methods to work

to maintain your prairie garden, making it a joint project with nature. Xeriscaping is just a word that means

working with nature and your yards dynamics; if you've got hot sun, plant accordingly, if you've got cool, wet,

ditto. Augmenting your soil to accommodate specific plants that will likely fair poorly despite all your efforts will

defeat the purpose. Create a garden that does that it is meant to do and all that hard work and sweat you seem

to put it can be translated into relaxating enjoyment of the space you call home, inside and out.