How-to

Like it or not, there’s no denying that back to school has arrived once again. Wasn’t it just yesterday we were all celebrating not having to come up with another lunch for kids who were sick of the ‘same old, same old?’ I know by the end of June I was ready to pull my hair out because my kids were sick of everything, but now that I’ve had some time away from the daily lunch grind, I’ve got some great ideas for back to school lunches. 

The most important part of your Smarthome network has nothing to do with the products you choose or how they interact with each other. Flashy coordination is nothing without a solid network connection. Without a stable wireless network setup, you won’t have a stable smarthome network. Read on about how to create an easy and smart wireless network for your smart home.

I spend a lot of time talking about creating recipes here on Shelly’s Friday Favourites, but I’ve discovered recently that some of the most delicious things in life don’t have to involve cooking at all. In fact, they don’t have to involve eating either.

Our road trip continues with a good old-fashioned pit stop at the Happiest Place on Earth. For some people, going to Disneyland means hitting all the shows, parades, and attractions. We like to do that too, but because we have annual passes and go so often, we’ve added to our adventure by becoming hunters for the best dishes and treats in the park. There are a lot of treats to be had, and they’re more delicious than you may think.

With 802.11ac (Gigabit Wi-Fi) now mainstream, we are currently in the midst of a big wireless router replacement cycle. I’ve tested so many routers in the past year that I’ve lost count. Despite the potential payoff of a new router, many people are reluctant to make the upgrade. Routers can be intimidating, and once our Wi-Fi is working, it’s such an integral part of our homes now that we’re naturally reluctant to do anything that might rock the boat. After getting a taste of what the latest generation of 802.11ac routers can do, I finally made the jump myself, replacing my own aging router. And to help you understand everything that’s involved, I chronicled every step of the process. Hopefully this account of one person’s Wi-Fi router upgrade will help to demystify the process and show why it’s worth doing.

Smart thermostats, smoke detectors, door locks and appliances have gone mainstream and are finding their way into more homes than ever. What sometimes gets lost in the list of cool things those smart devices can do is that they are connected. Without an Internet connection, most of them fizzle. Poor Wi-Fi means a poor user experience and for many people, their wireless router is the weak link in the smart equation. In this post, I’ll review the network and computer essentials for a smart home that lives up to the billing.

Flash can be a pretty unflattering style of lighting, and yet there are pros who use it successfully all the time. Today we’re going to look at some of the different ways you can use flash to make amazing photographs.

  You don’t have to be a pro to get rid of your cable subscription—all you have to do is call your cable provider. But what you need to figure out is how will I get great entertainment to watch. The good news is that there are more options every day for finding excellent content. But quitting your cable subscription cold-turkey can be pretty intimidating, especially if you tend to watch a fair bit of cable. I am going to try to make it easier.

With four kids in my house, we’ve done New Year’s at home more times than I can count, and just like our Christmas traditions, we have New Year’s traditions we like to do every year to make the night memorable. Here are a few ways you can celebrate New Year’s Eve at home.

Hot dips, cold veggies, wings, and delicious bites wrapped up in bacon or puff pastry – there are so many different types of appetizer recipes, you could make something new and different for every occasion during the year.