HOME CHECKLIST Just like grown-ups, children get bored with bland bedrooms. They sometimes need a change with punchy color and creative kid space. Fun details can add personality.

To help create the bedroom of your kids' dreams, here are some suggestions from the decorating experts at Dutch Boy paints:

• Start with color. Let the kids choose their favorites and get paint to match. But where to begin? Start with crayons, colors kids know and love. Dutch Boy, for example, offers 96 shades from the Crayola palette such as Granny Smith Apple, Razzmatazz, Crayola Canary and Inch Worm. (Find them in the Dutch Boy Refresh collection.) Paint quickly can transform a room. But go beyond walls. Paint dressers, chairs and other furniture bright colors to make the whole room pop.

• Create personal space. This can be done with a simple canopy. Hang lightweight fabric such as see-through mosquito netting or drapery sheers from four ceiling hooks to create a customized cover for his or her bed. It's like a fabric room within a room. Or make a "teepee" by hanging fabric over a circle area on the floor. Arrange plush cushions on the floor inside this tent to make a comfy reading nook or play space.

• Chalk it up. Use spray-on chalkboard paint (available from Krylon) to transform almost any flat surface into an easy-to-clean chalkboard. Paint the backside of a bulletin board or other sturdy panel with a few coats. Hang the board on the wall with a piece of colorful ribbon or set on an easel. Or transform a tabletop or toy box cover into a chalkboard – more space to be creative.

• Stick on some personal touches. Wall decals and oversized stickers are quick, easy and flexible; kids can take them down and move them around as their tastes change. Wall decals come in a wide range of sizes, shapes, colors and designs, from animals and flowers to movie characters and sports logos. For some ideas, click on www.roommatespeelandstick.com (which features a Sacramento Kings peel-and-stick border among hundreds of designs).

For more ideas on decorating children's rooms, visit the Dutch Boy website, www.dutchboy.com.

GARDEN CHECKLIST

• Clean up leaves and debris around fruit trees and rose bushes to prevent the spread of disease.

• Apply oil to fruit trees soon after a rain to control scale, mites and aphids. Oils need 24 hours of dry weather after application to be effective. Don't apply on foggy days.

• Prune hybrid tea, floribunda and grandiflora roses now for April bloom. For more flowers this spring, prune less severely for a taller bush. Prune canes to 24 to 30 inches tall instead of 12 to 18 inches.

• Divide daylilies, Shasta daisies and other perennials.

• Cut back chrysanthemums to 6 to 8 inches tall, and divide if necessary.

• In the vegetable garden, plant fava beans, head lettuce, mustard, onion sets, radicchio and radishes.

• Plant bare-root asparagus and root divisions of rhubarb.

• Plant bare-root roses, shrubs and trees.

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Call The Bee's Debbie Arrington, (916) 321-1075.

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