Preparing for winter II

kmiller4

Hello! Thanks so much for all your warm welcomes and help with the abbreviations. The abbreviation OH makes a lot of sense. I've always used DH for hubby-- but there certainly are days when OH would be a better fit--haha!

We have central heating in our homes here-- our house has a natural gas forced air furnace. We try to keep the heat set low-- about 64 degrees farenheit which would be about 17 degrees celsius. We can't put it too low as DH and the pets are here during the day. The natural gas comes into our house constantly through underground lines-- so no tank to fill like with heating oil or propane. However, electricity powers the furnace blower motor so no electricity = no heat We also have a woodstove in our den that we run most evenings in the cool/cold weather. This obviously necessitates having a decent supply of firewood which we order each autumn. I also try to do a fair bit of baking over the winter and that heats the kitchen a bit. I have an all electric kitchen range.

Our bedroom is fairly warm as it has 2 heat vents and is upstairs. We use flannel sheets and a warm down duvet and we are very cozy. All our animals (the 2 springers and the cat) have their own warm beds-- but dogs sneak up onto the living room sofa after we go to bed so I have taken to throwing a flannel sheet over that as well for them (and to keep the dog hair and muddy paw prints off my good sofa).

We usually have a couple of very fierce storms every winter so we plan ahead just in case the roads become inpassable. I do have a Subaru with all-wheel drive as I travel about 20 miles (about 32.5 km) to work one way over "back" roads. Plus we are used to winter driving. My DH has a snow blower machine and several shovels. The city (I think you might refer to this as the council?) has snowplows and keep the city roads fairly clear. Of course in the case of a severe winter storm it may take them many hours to get around to our street.

I have a large chest freezer in the basement and a smaller one on the refrigerator. I keep them mostly full of meats. I also have a couple of shelving units in the basement where I keep supplies of canned (tinned) and glass jarred goods. My kitchen pantry (basically a large closet) is where I keep extra flours, sugar, boxed items, noodles, rice, cereals etc.

I keep extra paper products as well-- toilet paper (loo rolls?), kleenex tissues, paper towels and extra personal toiletry items in the linen closet.

I do bake my own bread sometimes-- so that I do not need to take up valuable freezer space with bread items. I also do not freeze milk for this reason. I have some powdered milk in the pantry and keep meaning to pick up some milk in the aseptic packaging (UHT?) to keep on hand as well. I usually always have 1-2 dozen eggs in the fridge too. Here in the US eggs are kept refrigerated in the grocery store as well as at home. I have been to Europe, UK and Ireland a couple of times and was surprised to find them on a regular market shelf.

In case of power failure we have battery flashlights (torches), a hand crank flashlight/radio, cell (mobile) phones, candles and a few oil lamps. We can heat and cook with the woodstove. We also have a gas (propane) grill with side burner to cook on. In winter we could put cold items from the fridge or freezer in the garage or in a sealed container outside on our deck (patio). All of our windows are double paned energy efficient and our house if fairly well insulated.

We have plenty of warm winter clothing. My husband likes flannel or fleece lined blue jeans. In the house when relaxing we wear lots of sweatshirts and sweatpants and house slippers. I have many sweaters (Jumpers) although I have recently lost a lot of weight so will have to check to see if they still fit! and slacks for work as well as dresses and skirts. I am a college professor and a Nurse Practitioner (do you have Nurse Practitioners in the UK?-- advanced practice nurses with additional degrees and education that can do many of the same tasks that doctors do including examinations and ordering medications, diagnostic tests and treatments). I have been off work for the summer (students are off-- so faculty are as well). School starts up again on Monday :eek:and will go straight through until Christmas vacation (holiday). I will be one busy girl for the next 16 weeks or so.

Well, I hope you have enjoyed my story of winter/colder weather preparations. I look forward to hearing your comments and suggestions as well as continuing to learn from this wonderful forum!

Kathy

ifonlyitwaseasier

Justamum wrote: »

I was in Millets today and saw fleece jumpers on sale for £4.99 each. Even better it was 3 for 2, so I bought three of them for £9.98 :T

dammit!! i ended up on their website and spent £20 (-10% off thanks to code !!)

ah well gotta stay warm

broodylass_2

I was wondering if anyone has any ideas that I haven't thought of...please help

I've got a single skin wall utility room (washing machine, drier and freezer out there) which links straight on to our cavity wall kitchen. The floor of both rooms is tiled and the only thing to block off the utilty room from the kitchen is a rubbish wood bi-fold door. In the utility room there is a upvc outside door and a small window (ideally I want to get a upvc to block off utility room from kitchen but at the mo I can't afford that).

I'm planning to put up a curtain in the kitchen in front of the bi-fold door and get a rug for kitchen floor. But don't know if it'd be worth putting curtains up on door and window in utility room...? And was wondering if I've missed something else I could do...?

ifonlyitwaseasier

broodylass wrote: »

I was wondering if anyone has any ideas that I haven't thought of...please help

I've got a single skin wall utility room (washing machine, drier and freezer out there) which links straight on to our cavity wall kitchen. The floor of both rooms is tiled and the only thing to block off the utilty room from the kitchen is a rubbish wood bi-fold door. In the utility room there is a upvc outside door and a small window (ideally I want to get a upvc to block off utility room from kitchen but at the mo I can't afford that).

I'm planning to put up a curtain in the kitchen in front of the bi-fold door and get a rug for kitchen floor. But don't know if it'd be worth putting curtains up on door and window in utility room...? And was wondering if I've missed something else I could do...?

def go for curtains in there, and maybe bubble wrap over the glass too

CH27

sparrer wrote: »

Ah, so the Winter pixies have been to your house too?! :eek:

I'm so glad it's not just me:D:D

Prudent

Kathy welcome and thank you for a very interesting post. I like the sound of the fleece lined jeans. You sound much better prepared over there, especially with your food storage. I only have a tiny freezer and it was a problem in the prolonged snow we had in Scotland last winter. I am saving up for a fridge freezer for the kitchen which should give me more room. Your term is a similar length to ours (although we go to 23rd December) we have a one week break in October which is very welcome. I start back on Monday too.

Alisonpennypincher

Kathy, thanks so much for your post, i love hearing what others are doing for winter, and to hear about it from a different country makes it doubly interesting!

Sounds like you are well prepared and used to dealing with the bad snow, here in the UK it has come as a bit of a shock to most of us to get more than a covering of snow - would you believe that our town (Northampton) pretty much shut down a couple of years ago when we had about 6 inches of the white stuff, no work or school yipee!!

slm6002

Hi Kathy i love the idea of fleece lined trousers they sound so snuggly. My mum moved to USA a while back and has sent some of these over before for the kids but i thought they were just for the little ones not us grown ups. Thanks for sharing your winter bits with us

jamanda

ifonlyitwaseasier wrote: »

dammit!! i ended up on their website and spent £20 (-10% off thanks to code !!)

ah well gotta stay warm

Me too! - One each for me, DD, and 3 grandkids. £30 :eek:

Rainy-Days

Well, I cannot tell you all how thrilled I am with the flannelette sheets, I have just finished them off in the tumble dryer, they hardly needed any heat at all and even better was that in the lint collector there was half a little finger of fluff all told. How good is that!

So, I shall look at getting the second set ASAP now as these are just superb. Thought I would mention if you are interested they are made in Portugal and are a really substantial quality not flimsy at all. I think we may get a few years of use of these - hopefully

I have packed them away in plastic bags and laid them down with Lenor/Bounce tumble dryer sheets to keep them fresh and sweet smelling until I get them out October time.

Everybody is saying how Autumnal is it. DH is now really of the opinion that the earths axis could have shifted slightly when the Tsunami hit Japan and that is why we got an early summer in April and came into the rest of summer a bit too soon which is bringing Autumn and Winter forward. Don't know if he is right or not but he may have a theory there as it is know that after significant earth quakes it can alter the earths axis!

We have decided to put the garden furniture, hose, switching off the outside tap and covering it over and making sure all external locks and hinges are oiled by the end of September now. If it does hit sooner everything is closed down and put away outside. I think thats sensible really - hope you have all had a great day today and are being frugal and prepping :T