Anonymous wrote:MY DH is a huge advocate of Youtube for home repair instruction. He's somewhat handy and we have books but there's nothing like the videos. He just did a bunch of patching in our house and watch youtube to get the technique right.

My DH does the same thing. I can't recall if he took the drywall class at HD 15 years ago when he learned to drywall (after he stepped through the floor in the attic, thus putting a big hole in the bedroom ceiling).

He just Youtube'd himself into resealing our deck and fixing our circuit breaker.

MY DH is a huge advocate of Youtube for home repair instruction. He's somewhat handy and we have books but there's nothing like the videos. He just did a bunch of patching in our house and watch youtube to get the technique right.

Easy. Just get a piece of drywall, even if it was plaster, put it in secure, coat with dry wall compound - works better than sparkle, sand and paint. Use the mesh tape if you want. We sometimes do, sometimes not.

Patch it with drywall and use the wet sponge method of sanding. You can do this yourself for very little money.

Anonymous wrote:If there are holes in plaster you can patch with drywall. Easier and neater and not too difficult. Watch YouTube videos.

THAT is smart. Why didn't I think of that?

It really depends on the size- I had insulation added to knee walls resulting in 3 medium sized holes in the drywal (~ 15 x 22 inches) and started to do this myself, but have decided to have a contractor/handyperson finish --the sanding and cleaning up after the sanding is a PITA.

Home Depot has free drywall workshops, and free workshops on quite a few other topics. That might be a good place to start.

If there are holes in plaster you can patch with drywall. Easier and neater and not too difficult. Watch YouTube videos.

small holes are easy to patch. Once you get to square feet, it becomes harder to get a smooth surface.

Following plumbing repairs in our old rowhouse there are several square feet of holes in walls made of either drywall or lath/metal screen plaster. Before I get estimates I was thinking, is this something I can teach myself to do? I can follow directions and am pretty handy with plumbing, electrical, etc. but am kind of lazy. Could use the saved $$ though. What do you think?