Writing a short how to article

Writing this how to article is really an experiment, I want to experiment with how many words it takes to write an article about a pretty basic diy job, what kind of vocabulary to use - simple or more complex - and whether it’s a good idea to include a photograph in the article.

I think that the article will also be useful to diy-ers, especially if it includes a photo, which I plan to do. But for now I just want to see how it looks without a picture. if you’re planning to write a how to and can’t decide whether to include photographs, this article might be useful for you. You’ll be able to compare the `before and after’ effect.
In a future post I’ll analyse the article and compare it with another how to which I’m writing, an article called, aptly enough, Writing a how to article.
Here goes: `If your home has brick walls and if you do diy jobs around your home you will probably finish up with a hole in one of the walls at some point. It will then have to be filled up, but what’s the best way of doing this?
A lot of people make the mistake of mixing a mix of sand and cement and trying to fill the hole with this. It doesn’t work. If the hole is any deeper than about an inch in depth the mix won’t stay inside it. After about a minute, it will crack and start to fall out of the hole.

The reason for this is, the mix needs something to bond to, something solid to fix itself to, and it doesn’t have this. The solution to the problem is to give the mix something solid to bond to, so that it won’t fall out of the wall.
The best material for this is small pieces of broken brick or concrete. Mix a mix of sand and cement to the ratio of 3 to 1. This means a mix of three parts of sand and one part of cement. You don’t have to be too exact, but this is the ratio to aim for.
Lay a layer of mix in the hole about half an inch deep. Lay it on the floor of the hole, on the walls and on the top of the hole. Place a piece of broken brick or concrete into the hole, on top of the mix. Lay another half inch of mix on top of the broken brick or concrete.
Lay another half inch of mix on top of this. Continue like this until the hole is completely filled. Then, using the same mix, plaster some of the mix over the surface of the hole, so that its flush with the wall.
If you later plan to plaster over the hole, so that it has a smooth finish, scrape out about 1\4 inch of the mix from the hole. When you’re ready to plaster over the hole, fill this 1\4 hole with plaster.’