All across America, parents are putting toys together and teens are hooking up shelves for racks to hold tons of CDs. Millions are having problems because there just aren't that many good screwdrivers out there. Some are using bent or broken tools or the wrong-sized ones, or worse, a coin or butter knife to do the job.

When it comes to New Year's resolutions, it's a good idea to include some home improvement resolutions that will save time, money and keep your home in good shape.

This time of year, a slice of Key lime pie is the next best thing to a trip to the Florida Keys. Okay, maybe not the next best thing, but good eating anyway.

Big apple trees

Cold, gray, wet January days give us the perfect excuse to be indoors planning spring and summer gardens. Is there a more pleasurable way to spend the time than looking at seed catalogs and imagining bright summer blooms and harvests from the vegetable garden? We have to avoid walking on soggy garden soil anyway, especially clay soil, so as not to compact it.

The floodwaters are receding, but it's still January -- gray, lifeless and cold. That is, unless you're Napa interior designer Thomas Bartlett, who can escape the dreary month with a quick plane trip and drive to his hacienda in La Penita de Jaltemba, Mexico.