Homes

When you first fell in love with that lofty condo, you couldn't imagine anything better. Oh, the freedom of undivided space, the Bohemian spirit of exposed brick walls, and those scraped and gouged wood floorboards have such stories to tell.

Walk out the front door of a house under construction in Santa Monica, California, and the bridge over a koi pond in the front yard leads to stepping stones, then a meditation deck that appears to float in the water.

San Francisco looks to test pint-sized apartments

You keep a pretty clean home. Sure, sometimes your rigid cleaning schedule has to bend here and there to accommodate life, but your house/apartment/condo stays pretty darn tidy. You clean all the usual suspects: kitchen sinks, counters and floors.

Fall is the best time to prepare lawns for the next growing season by mowing, raking, aerating and fertilizing. The game plan changes, though, if drought-stressed grass has been dormant for a long time.

For small, mom-and-pop shops that produce goods for the home but don't have big advertising budgets, the Internet helps level the playing field, attracting customers who are looking for something different.

Tjernlund Products' AireShare transfer fans let you move heated or cooled air from one room or level of your house to another.

DAZZLING DESIGN by Amanda Nisbet Stewart, Tabori and Chang 224 pages, $57.50 Interior designer Amanda Nisbet lets readers inside some of her favourite rooms - and inside her thought processes - in her new book, Dazzling Design.

What the spring and early summer lamentably lacked in sunshine and warmth, this month has surely made up. Everyone I spoke with through September voiced delight in the glorious warmth and blue skies.

Ever dream of having a garden that's colourful spring through fall? Planting alliums is one way to realize that dream, according to bulb experts.