Turn your heat down willya?

Are you tired of paying for the Natural Gas or Heating Oil company exec's new cars? Are you annoyed that your heating bill has gone up and is going to go higher? Me too.

I say let's stick it to the man and turn our thermostats down. Oh and the whole reducing your carbon footprint thing? Well that will just happen naturally if you play along with me.

Here's our current situation - hopefully some of my solutions will help you too.

We live in a 1500 sf tri-level 1969 ranch. All our windows and doors are original and the insulation is minimal at best. Until this summer, we had zero insulation under the floors and they used to get icy cold!

We had the crawlspace insulated in September (as deep as the rafters are...but I forget the R value, I think 17). In Oregon we rarely get snow or ice, and even more rarely have the temps drop under 30. But in an old drafty house like this one, mild weather doesn't help at all! It's still hard to keep it warm.

Here are a few things that I am working on to help offset our heat needs this winter.

I have collected old linen tablecloths and sheets from yard-sales over the years. I am turning them into multi-layered curtains. First I stitch a rod pocket into the tablecloth and slip it over a tension rod that is placed on the inside of the window frame. Then I stitch up a double thick top curtain of a sheet, tablecloth or whatever I have handy. I place those on a rod that extends outside the window frame. That way there is dead air between the layers of curtains (dead air = insulation).

I am going to make window quilts this year from sheets and old blankets (just sandwich the blanket inside the sheets and voila, quilt) for the two sliding doors and huge picture window. They ooze cold when the weather turns. I like to make the top layer of my curtains really snazzy so the house still looks all cute (but frugal) hehe.

We are also layering rugs on the hardwood floors in the bedrooms to stave off chilly toes. Same in the living room, but we have carpet and new insulation. So the extra rugs are just extra coziness.

We have an unusable fireplace that sucks warm air out of our house...so we put a yard-sale find super heavy 1950s style bookcase on the hearth and have blocked the draft and created a nifty place to store the baby's books.

We also spent time this weekend pulling all outlet and switch covers and placing foam inserts inside.

Next up is a heavy blanket for the kitchen/ garage door...it'll make a huge difference in the house I am sure. My dad has done this for years and it really is amazing how warm the kitchen gets once the door is insulated.

Cooking at home helps heat your house for free. A pot of boiling water or soup, or some potatoes in the oven really heats our house up.

When we are done baking, or the dishwasher finishes its cycle we open them and let their heat flow into the house. We also let warm water from the bath sit in the tub until the water cools.

Add to all these things a nice cozy sweater and socks, and a fluffy blanket for the couch and it won't feel so bad when your thermostat reads 63*.

As part of the Freeze Yer Buns Challenge we've comitted to no more than 65* during the day and 50* at night. We have zillions of blankets and we co-sleep with the baby so it should be fine.

As another blogger so aptly said - I'm looking forward to the overpayment notice from NW Natural Gas in the spring when my equal pay bills for the winter all level out.

***Addendum - I also use the sun to passively heat my home by opening all the south facing curtains when it is sunny out in the winter. It's really incredible how much heat the sun puts out when it is magnified through glass.

Impulse purchase at Lowe's today

Well sorta an impulse purchase...I have been thinking about buying a chainsaw for ages to cut up a big pile of shrubbery into burnable chunks.

I was in Lowe's today and they had a little 14" electric chainsaw for $44. It works great. I played lumberjane today and made firewood! What a hoot.

The baby cried the entire time though. Not sure if it was the noise, or if he thought something was going to happen to mommy. I had daddy take him inside while I finished a couple of little logs. My oldest son came over and cut down some more shrubbery for me. He's definitely much stronger than I. What took him 15 minutes would have taken me an hour! GRR!!

We're having a guy come next week to give a quote on installing a woodstove into our fireplace opening. I'm excited to have a fire in the house again. It's been about 3 years since the inspector told us not to use the chimney due to a huge crack in it. So having it repaired (if we can afford it) and putting the insert in is going to save so much money in the long run! NW Natural Gas and their 35% rate hike this winter can kiss my patootey! We're going back to basics and burning wood.

Our house is old and poorly insulated and we have so much trouble keeping it above 65* in the winter. No matter how high the thermostat is. It also costs us $220 - $270/ month just for the gas bill, this doesn't include the $120 - $150 for electricity! I'm completely done spending so much on utilities. If something doesn't change this winter, we are all going to huddle in one room with an electric heater. Bah!

Anyways my plans to keep the house warm are:

Insulate the UNINSULATED crawl space under the living room. The floor is positively icy in winter.

Install low e film on the picture window in the living room (and both sliders).

Put plastic film over same window & sliders.

Make insulated curtains for all the windows in the house.

Have the furnace cleaned and inspected.

Install a woodstove insert and use it faithfully.

Flip the switch on the ceiling fan to the winter setting (whatever that is...I know it's supposed to be opposite the summer setting, but since I do not know what the summer setting is, I am in trouble!).

Insulate the hot water heater if we cannot afford to replace it with a tankless.

Install new front door. Important! Needs to be done, no matter what.

Buy rugs for the hardwood bedroom floors. BRRR.

That is all that I can think of for now.

xoxo