This is not design-related, but it’s hopefully helpful…
Over the past few weeks I’ve learned more than a ton about buying a house. I am hoping to close this coming Friday, so there’ll be more to write about then, but so far, here’s what I’ve found out:

First of all, it’s not THAT hard to do. All you need to do is clean up your credit score, and get some money together. If you save 5% of the cost for your down payment and then count on $9,000 for closing costs, that’s about it. It may seem like way too much money to spend up front, and if that’s the case, you could do a no money down sort of thing, but your interest rate on your mortgage will be higher than if you put 5 or 10% down. In an ideal world, I would have put 20% down, but that’s just a bit outrageous at this point.

So, after figuring out what you can afford, and actually finding a house that you like (and you should definitely get the feeling that the house is a place that you could see yourself feeling good about even when you’re alone there at night - my fear always), you need to get the house inspected. This can be expensive; I paid around $500 total for the radon (do it!!) and the regular inspections. In Philly, there are a lot of old houses with lead drain pipes and “knob and tube” wiring. My house has both in parts. The inspection of my house revealed that both of these were present. So, this put the ball back in the Seller’s court; he had to agree to fix these problems before we could go to closing.

Since that’s as far as I’ve gotten so far with the buying part, I’m going to delve back into the prep work:

Getting a good mortgage rate can be hard if you don’t have good credit, so if you think that there’s even a remote possibility that you’d be interested in buying soonish, get your credit score in good shape. You can do a google search for a free credit report to find out what’s going on with your score for starters. I’m not an expert on whipping your credit into shape, but I’d guess that paying back debt is one major help.

If you’re self-employed like I am it can be hard to get a traditional mortgage. I had to do what’s called a “No Doc,” which means that the lender won’t look at things like my tax return (which is pathetic), or my past few years’ income, etc. Instead, I have to put 10% down (which I’ve been preparing for for quite a while, so luckily I have the money to do it) and have EXCELLENT credit.
However, if you have pretty good income from the past few years, a great way to show you’re a good bet for a loan of a lot of money is to diversify your assets. PLEASE don’t keep all of your money in a checking account. I’ll explain why.

My brother talked some sense into me and I began seeing my money in chunks of $5,000. If left alone in a checking account, these chunks suffered; they actually lost money for me. If you have a few thousand, put a chunk into a money market fund. Paypal has one of the highest rates at the moment - you can make 4% of your money back in a year just by having it in one of these funds. Another way to put money aside and have it work FOR you is to put some in a mutual fund. I’ve put some in an Index fund…I’ll write more on investing soon…

The point is, though, that having diverse assets can really help you make your money work for you. You’ll have more money when you want to buy a house AND you’ll have another way to show your mortgage lender that you’re a good bet, which may secure you a lower interest rate.

The following posts explain the basics of screenprinting. I hope they’re helpful…

with the image burned into the screen, align the screen with the guide image on the rig
(this guide image will be especially important if you are printing multiple layers of ink.)

use packing tape to tape off any edges that might not have emulsion applied to them
(this helps prevent ink coming through the screen in areas that aren’t intended.)

apply ink to the screen in an area that won’t touch the image (top or bottom)

with the screen lifted slightly, swipe a “flood stroke” to apply ink evenly to the screen.

allow the screen to be set down on the paper, and use pressure to “pull” the ink across the screen through
to the paper.

lift the screen and remove your print to let it dry.

*note, if you’re printing on fabric, you won’t use the same type of rig. instead, you can place a piece of
cardboard underneath the layer of fabric that you wish to print on and proceed.

Resources

www.victoryfactory.com
www.diehippiedie.com
www.tribe.net
www.diynet.com

setup - applying emulsion

1. in a “darkroom” (any small room with a red light) mix sensitizer and emulsion together according to the
instructions on the label.
2. in the dark, pour some sensitized emulsion into the scoop coater and apply to the upright screen, keeping in mind that you should apply just enough of a thin coat to cover the mesh.
3. let the screen dry (i use a fan to hasten the process.)

setup - the image

1. get a transparency of the graphic that you want to use made at kinko’s. think of the transparency as a stencil. the images should be black where
you want color to be and transparent everywhere else. you’ll need to print a separate transparency for each color that
you want to print.
2. place the transparency backwards on the screen once the emulsion has dried. place the acrylic sheet on top of
the screen and transparency to keep it flat and place the black board under the screen to make sure that light doesn’t bounce back up through the screen to expose the back.

setup - the exposure area

1. cut a cross in the center of the pie tin and place the light fixture through the hole. then put the bulb into the
fixture and hang the whole contraption 10 inches from the screen (for a small screen) or 14 inches from the
screen (for a large screen.)
2. expose the screen to light (based on using a 150 watt photoflood bulb) for 10 minutes (for a small screen) or 20 minutes (for a large screen.)

setup - rinsing

1. once the screen is finished being “burned,” rinse it under the bathtub sink until the loose emulsion rinses
out. you may wish to get a bristle brush to help the process along. just make sure to be gentle.
2. dry the screen

setup - the rig

1. screw the hinges to a piece of thick particle board or wood (anything flat and sturdy will do.)
2. glue a piece of cardboard the size of the paper that you’ll be using to the rig to lift it slightly off the base.
3. glue slightly thicker pieces of cardboard to the area immediately around the edge of the cardboard to serve
as guides for alignment.
4. tape a printout of your design on the large cardboard to use as a guide for registration.