Dust off your tools!

With fine spring weather and a long weekend ahead, Easter is the perfect time for DIY-ers to dust off their tools and set to work on some of the jobs around the house that have been building up over the winter.

Persistent rain, high winds and snow can take their toll on the outside of the house, so once it's fine enough to get outside again, take the opportunity to assess and repair any damage to external woodwork, gutters and drains and fences around the garden. The new season also inspires even the most reluctant DIY-er to spring clean, spruce up the house by decorating tired rooms and finally put up those shelves that have been waiting for so long. And with the promise of summer just around the corner, with its long hot days and balmy evenings out in the garden, make sure you're ready to make the most of it with great, functional and stylish outdoor spaces for relaxing and entertaining.

This month Reader’s Digest publish the brand new edition of its best-selling Reader’s Digest DIY Manual (£14.99) - over 3 million copies of the book have been sold in the UK to date. For the first time, this new edition of the manual comes with a free CD-ROM. The CD includes a step-by-step guide to 36 key DIY projects and a ‘Ready Reckoner’ for estimating those all important material quantities – brilliant for those of us who can never work out how many rolls of wallpaper we need!

Here are the editor’s top ten DIY projects for the Easter weekend:

CLEAR GUTTERS
Check gutters and downpipes for blockages from fallen leaves and debris that has accumulated over the winter. You can make a simple gutter scoop to clear away the debris by cutting the bottom from a plastic motor-oil container and using the spout as a handle.

CHECK AND REPAIR EXTERNAL WOODWORK
Prod wooden windowsills, frames and doors with a bradawl to detect rot under the paintwork where water has penetrated over the winter. Scrape away the rotten wood, allow it to dry and fill with wood filler before priming and repainting.

SAND FLOORS
Hire a sander for the bank holiday weekend and sand and varnish your floors so they look as good as new. Check the floorboards before sanding and punch in any nail heads that might rip the sander belt. Work across the length of the boards and for old boards that curl up the edges make the first runs diagonally with a coarse belt. Use an edging sander to get right into the corners.

PAINT THE FRONT DOOR
Smarten up your whole house in no time by giving the front door a fresh lick of paint. It if has been a while since it was last painted and the finish is starting to crack, or if you've noticed the door starting to stick because it has so many coats of paint on it, make the most of a fine weekend to strip the door back to bare wood before priming and repainting it.

PAINT A ROOM
A new coat of paint will transform the look of a room. Always emulsion the ceiling first so any splashes on walls are covered up later.
Using a roller, apply paint in horizontal or vertical bands then blend the parallel bands together. Paint walls in strips about 500mm wide, working from top to bottom. Finish off around door and window frames.

WALLPAPER A ROOM
If there is a radiator on the wall you are papering, cut the paper to length so you can tuck about 200mm down behind the radiator.
Use a radiator paint roller if you have one to press the paper in place.
Otherwise improvise by taping some sponge to a slim batten.

PUT UP SHELVES
When putting up new shelving, first check whether it will bow under the weight you intend to put on it. Rest the shelf on bricks set at the proposed bracket spacing, load it up and lay a straightedge along its top surface. If the shelf bows, either move the bricks (and therefore the shelf brackets) closer together or increase the thickness of the shelf material.

ASSEMBLE AN ITEM OF FLAT-PACK FURNITURE
If you've come home from a Bank holiday trip to the furniture or DIY store with a flat-packed piece of furniture, make sure you get it right when putting it together. Always unpack the box carefully and lay out all the pieces and fixings before you start to assemble them. Check them against the instructions to make sure that everything is there and that you are sure which piece is which.

LAY A PATIO OR DECK
When laying a new patio, you can make the patio look bigger or longer by using brick or paver patterns. If bricks run lengthways they give the impression of extra length and bricks running across the patio will make it look broader. Always keep patterns clear and simple, and avoid mixing them, for the best effects. Similarly, when building decking lay the boards along the long edge of the area to make it seem longer. Lay boards with their grooves running towards an adjacent flowerbed to allow water to drain away and to make sweeping up a breeze.

BUILD A BARBECUE
Get set for summer entertaining by constructing a permanent brick-build barbecue. Building it yourself means that you can make it to your own personal specifications, including preparation or storage areas and a sheltered place to keep the charcoal. The dimensions of your cooking area will be dictated by the size of the grill and charcoal pan, so buy these first and design the barbecue around them.

REPAIR A ROTTEN OR FALLEN FENCE
If high winds have felled a fence panel or rot has destroyed the base of a supporting post, standard sizes make it easy to make repairs without replacing the whole fence. To replace a post without taking down the fence, support the two adjacent panels from both sides of the fence with sturdy lengths of timber wedged under the panel top or upper arris rail.

Reader’s Digest DIY Manual with CD-Rom is now available price £14.99