Troubles of a musician

I'll just tell everyone up front that, if you have never had to restring a guitar, it is a pain in the butt. Just one little mistake can ruin an enitire set of strings, and then you're out the money for the strings and the fifteen minutes that it took to string them. And then the worst part is when the strings are put on wrong, and they mess up the neck, creating buzzing spots and an uneven fretboard.
If you're a famous musician who has roadies to do all of this for you, I guess you visited my blog for nothing. On the other hand, if you are like me and have to do all of this yourself, I've come up with a short list of steps that can be a big help.

1. Always buy good quality strings. Not the cheapo dollar kind that you can get at Walmart. Usually a major name brand like Ernie Ball or GHS will do the trick.
2. Have a good work area to begin restringing. An area where you have to get in an uncomfortable position ( like the kitchen table, especially when your mom is trying to cook dinner, and yelling at you for getting your guitar in the potatoes) is not the best place to work, causing you to rush and maybe make a costly mistake.
3. Leave enough string on, so if you mess up you can do a retry. The companies who made these strings knew what they were doing when they made the strings. A good rule my guitar teacher told me to follow is to go about three to four tuners up and that should be good.
4. When stringing, give the string a little slack and keep a firm hold on it to keep the string from winding to quick. The more times the tuners go around the better the string will sound due to resonance and tension. No one wants loose strings right?
5. Safety first. You, as the reader may be thinking, "Man, how could restringing a guitar be so dangerous?" Well, sharp fine wire, a lot of tension, and bending over the area where you are stringing and cutting, could turn from a easy project to learning to wear an eye patch. You may look more like a pirate after, if that's what you want, but I think if God put something on our bodies, it needs to stay there. Wearing safety glasses can help with this.
6. Make sure your guitar is in tune. This is one of the most redundant statements I will make, but is the most important. Just stringing the guitar is only half the battle. Then the fun of trying to get the guitar in tune begins. If you have to play a concert and need new strings, I would suggest putting them on at least a week before (unless you are at the gig and a string breaks; in that case just slap on the new ones and go).

These simple rules have served me well and hopefully you too. Until I get my fame and fortune from music, I'll be stuck doing all this to, so just know you are not alone. Also be sure to remember to tell everyone in several years that the legendary Chris Elms taught you via blog how to string a guitar. Hey, it could happen.