Enclosed Canopies

All Season Coverage

Portable Sheds

Durable and Compact Design.

Portable Garages

10 Oz. poly covers and all steel frames.

Event Tents

Party and vendor tents for all occasions.

Pop Up Canopies

Easy installation and take down.

Tuesday, April 28, 2015

Transforming a Tarp into a Toss Game for Kids

For DIY fun for the kids, create a toss game with a tarp, duct tape, a felt-tip marker, rope and scissors. Invent a football toss game, or size your carnival midway-style game to fit sponge balls or spare tennis balls.

Here’s how it work. Spread your tarp on the ground and use a pencil to mark squares through which the ball you choose will easily fit. Draw other squares with smaller openings for challenge tosses.

 Cut out the squares, and line the openings with ordinary or colored duct tape. With your large felt-tip pen, write down points to win for easy throws and more points possible for more difficult throws. Decide on a final number, and declare the first person to reach that number the winner. Because tarps come with grommets around the border, position your game by simply threading the rope through the grommets and attaching to trees or fence posts.

Use a piece of chalk or wide ribbon secured with rocks on either end to establish your throw line. You can also draw a line in the dirt with your shoe.

Allow younger children to stand behind throw lines that are closer to the targets on the tarp. Points are scored when the ball is thrown through the marked opening from the throw line.
Families love this use of tarps to create an economical game for all ages. It takes just a few minutes to order low-cost tarps online at outlets like TarpSurplus.com.

Because tarps fold up for storage, it’s also easy to transport this game in a paper bag or backpack. Take your new toss game to the backyard, a neighborhood park or on that next family vacation.

Tuesday, April 21, 2015

Protect Those Plant Seedlings With Tarps

Gardeners around the country turn to tarps when frost threatens their plants and delicate seedlings. Before a cold front moves in, build a simple frame and drape the tarp over the frame to prevent damage. The grommets on the borders of the tarp will allow you to secure the tarp with rope.

If you don’t have time, you can gently lay a lightweight tarp directly on top of your plants. Using a tarp stops the loss of heat rising from the plants and soil. When the sun comes out and the frost is gone the next day, remove the tarp to prevent overheating from the sun’s rays.

If frost is expected to return the next day, generously water the seedlings and soil during the day to store up heat overnight. Then, again cover the plants and seedlings with a tarpaulin.
Photo Credit: katerha via Compfight cc
Smart gardeners keep tarps handy for weather emergencies. Order ready-made tarps from knowledgeable retailers like oursevles. We offer economy tarps for as little as $2 or less for those on tight budgets. Lightweight tarps can be cut to size with sharp scissors for small garden plots.

Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Create a Backyard Pond with Tarps

You don’t have to hire a professional to create a backyard pond. A tarp lining can help you create a shallow pool to fill with water and add water-ready plants. Those beautiful plants will also attract birds, butterflies and other colorful wildlife.

If you’re on a very limited budget and don’t mind a temporary pond, water resistant tarps have been used as liners. However, water resistant tarps are not waterproof, so expect leakage.

For a sturdier pond ling, use a waterproof PVC tarp. Or, turn to rugged polyethylene containment liners from retailers like TarpSurplus.com. These specialty tarpaulins are 20 ml thick to resist tears and punctures, and they are cut to order to fit the size of your pond.

Photo Credit: Kyknoord via Compfight cc
Before you order a custom poly containment pond liner, accurately measure your future pond at the widest, longest and deepest points. Include room for an anchor trench that’s at least 12 inches wide and 12 inches deep. This trench is what helps prevent the liner from slipping down sloped ground.

When taking measurements, allow for the contraction and expansion that occurs when temperatures change during the year. Contraction can cause ripples to form on the pond liner, shrinking its original size.

You can find a free how-to chart to help you measure for a residential pond tarp on the Poly Containment/Pond Liners page at www.TarpSurplus.com. Print out this chart as a handy guide to ensure you don’t forget to include space for a trench and other landscaping features.

While it’s a tempting idea to visit a nearby creek or stream to find pretty water plants, you might be breaking local laws. Contact local parks departments or natural resources agencies to learn if removing certain plants from local waters is allowed.

Tuesday, April 7, 2015

Our Spring Cleaning Secret? Ordinary Tarps

Our family used to stock up on empty boxes and bags to fill with clutter before our annual spring-cleaning roundup. Old boxes and bags would be pulled from closets and garage shelves to be sorted into each new marked bag or box.

The plan was to condense our piles then set upon the place with mops, vacuum cleaners and scrubbing brushes.

By the time we had sorted and packed the new boxes, exhaustion inevitably set in. We’d declare defeat and shove everything back into the closets and onto the shelves.

It wasn’t spring cleaning; it was a futile game of annually rearranging our growing mounds of stuff into even more boxes and bags.

Then we discovered tarps, those inexpensive poly vinyl sheets that are mainstays for wall painters, landscapers and construction sites. Problem solved.

Indoors, we would spread a tarp over the floor of a room and dump the boxes from closets directly onto the waterproof tarps. If something broke or spilled, the tarp protected our floors. Instead of buying new boxes, we vowed to use only half the existing boxes.

Once we saw the sheer quantity of our stuff scattered over the tarp surface, our descent into hoarding became obvious. Decisions on what to keep were much easier with a forced limit on boxes. I wasn’t going to throw out family heirlooms to keep around stacks of old sweaters.

For the garage, we purchased tarps designed to safely contain hazardous chemicals. We spread one onto the garage floor, where it became quickly piled with paint cans and spray bottles containing only dregs of the original contents. Piles of rusty nails and what we labeled mystery tools joined the heap.

With the job done, we simply folded the corners to package the trash for disposal. Call your city government offices about proper hazardous waste disposal.

The tarps coverage contained dirt and spills, so cleanup was easy. With fewer stuff in the house and garage, cleaning up is easier throughout the year.

Tarps are easy to come by, selling for as little as $2 or less at websites like our own. For Spring Cleaning season, we consider them priceless.