No heating/ hot water, OS ways to cope

Alison_Funnell

Iron or tumble dry your clothes warm. ANd wrap towels round a hot water bottle - that also helps preventing you chilling.

adelight

I can't think what they'd be called, but my Dad has this big plastic water container which you "pump" the lid of and it then sprays out water like a little shower, you can use them to clean off cars but you could fill it up with kettle water and have a mini shower.

Pink_Giraffe

babyshoes wrote: »

If you are a member of a gym you could shower there - maybe investigate short term free membership if you can find some - wasn't there something in this week's newsletter? Otherwise, pay to use the pool at a leisure centre - you don't have to swim, just use the showers if someone gets desperate!

Also ask on freecycle for heaters if you can't borrow from friends or family.

I only shower at home on weekends as I go swimming every morning and shower there, saved us loads!

If you were going to pay to use your local leisure centre for the shower, some PCTs offer a scheme where you can get reduced prices for a set period of time - I saw a nurse at my local practice and said I wanted to do more exercise and got signed up immediately so it may be worth looking into.

As everyone else has said, layers and blankets are the best ways for heating, I also find fingerless gloves really useful as my hands get really cold - they get some heat but I can still do things!

Hope your boiler is sorted soon.

C_Mababejive

Do not leave a cooker/hob/oven on for long periods of time to heat a house or you might die.

ubamother

if there are rooms you can live without using, shut their curtains and doors, block up the bottom of their doors with blankets etc., make sure unheated rooms like a utility or loo have their doors blocked as well. As much one-room living as possible. Does the 19 yr old have any friends they can go to for a few nights, then the two of you could camp in the lounge and block off more rooms. Can you move some of your basic kitchen equipment into your lounge to avoid losing body heat by going into your cold kitchen all the time and losing room heat by opening the door too often - I'm thinking kettle, coffee maker, toaster, whatever you use, along with basic milk, tea/coffee, butter, bread ...

northern_star

Thanks all, some really useful suggestions there. We managed our first night with hot water bottles and blankets in the lounge and the electric fire on from time to time. Trouble is, when you leave the room - even closing the door straight behind - a lot of the heat escapes and disappears. It's making us think that maybe our house isn't as well insulated as it might be (so good lessons to learn from this). This morning we're about to tackle the washing up by rinsing all the pots and clearing them as best we can with cold water and then washing them in a bowl of kettle heated hot water and detergent, followed by a cold water rinse. We cook everything from scratch and always seem to generate masses of washing up (another opportunity to learn better methods). We're still debating the best way to manage the strip wash/shower issue but we have been offered the opportunity to take a bath at a relative's house. Also today, we need to get on with ringing heating engineers to get quotes - and we're dreading what the cost will be! Hopefully it will be a simple boiler replacement without the need for lots of alterations to the rest of the system (fingers crossed). In true OS fashion, we'll be looking for the most economical, cost effective option

RachelS

What helped me when our boiler was broken in November...when you cook something in your cooker, open the cooker door as soon as you turn it off. The heat coming out makes a huge difference.

Cover your windows with something...we used throws pegged up over the curtains.

Slinky

Just a warning about tipping boiling water into your basin, put some cold in first to take the 'shock' off. My mum cracked the glazing on our bathroom basin years ago tipping water straight out of a kettle into it.

bizzylizzy

Candles give off a surprising amount of heat, shut the door to the room as well and that really helps.

heretolearn_2

Those dry shampoo sprays work well so you won't have to worry about trying to wash your hair or it looking greasy.