Preparing for winter III

Rose_Crow

Yay - the list is being crossed off at a more satisfying rate. Got all feed in for horses, top field (winter paddock) is ready for the horses to move into at the weekend as the grass in the summer paddock has completely stopped growing now. Got my horsey coat fixed and plumber is fitting new rads as I type. Need to get one of the ponies a new rug as we got the old one out and it's knackered, will wait until Your Horse Live to hopefully get a bargain.

Well done with everyone's preps, looks like you're all getting on well.

House / Other

[STRIKE]Get salt / grit for steps[/STRIKE]
[STRIKE]Buy cover for outside furniture[/STRIKE]
Get boiler serviced - Quotes obtained, waiting for payday
[STRIKE]Have rads replaced in bedroom and bathroom[/STRIKE]
[STRIKE]Follow up - Paint bathroom[/STRIKE] (only one wall, rest are tiles) - where the old rad was taken off, the area behind needs painting, we can remove the new rad and paint behind, but have to do this before we connect it and switch on.
Fix gutter at front of house - Don't have a ladder long enough, and if we could borrow one, we don't have a suitable car to transport it
Buy draught excluders
Possible curtain for front door
[STRIKE]Buy blind for bathroom[/STRIKE]
Finish painting windows (2 down, 3 to go!)
[STRIKE]Paint fence / shed / decking[/STRIKE]
[STRIKE]Buy hot water bottle
Add extra insulation to loft
Buy Yaktrax[/STRIKE]
[STRIKE]Buy USB heated fingerless gloves[/STRIKE]

Car

Buy 4 new tyres (very cheap and nasty ones when I bought car = very slippery in rain!)
Buy glow plugs and change - bit of a nightmare, managed to change 1 of 3 successfully, but broke the other 2, need to order more

Horses

Send rugs to be washed - change of plan, only one really needs washing, so will send that in at the weekend
[STRIKE]Buy hay[/STRIKE] :j
[STRIKE]Get outdoor coat zip fixed[/STRIKE]
Buy welly liners
[STRIKE]Buy soft hay replacer feed for old girl[/STRIKE]
[STRIKE]Buy lo-cal chaff for fat pony[/STRIKE] - £FREE :j
[STRIKE]Buy and install remaining electric fence rings to protect rugs from fence damage[/STRIKE] (my horses are hooligans and don't understand that rugs cost money!!)
Buy new rug for Mist
[STRIKE]Buy Ikea bags and sledge for moving hay in snow[/STRIKE]

tugrin

Its 18 degrees here! Just taken the dogs for a walk in a vest and fleece and have returned sweating!!! AND nasturtiums are still flowring away like nobodys business - calm before the storm??
Have painted the bricks on the kitchen staircase to brighten room up a bit and cleaned the fridge out so not really prep but it does feel like everything I do is winter prep. - I feel sort of that's-another-job-done-before-the winter-sets-in and its very satisfying.

MarilynMonroe_2

My nasturtiums are still going strong too, infact the front garden still has plenty colour going!
well 4.30 and its now pretty dark, time to shut the curtains and get snuggled down for the evening

kit

Hi all.
Had my loft insulated today and 2 of my walls done with cavity insulation. Unfortunately the walls in the coldest part of my house (the extension) are made of wood so can't be done Not sure what else I can do in the extension, wood walls so no cavity insulation, flat roof so nothing I can do there, large windows which already have floor length curtains and radiators with silver stuff behind. Wouldn't be so bad if it was a small part of the house, but its over half of the floor space and houses my utility room, some of my hall, my lounge and dining room. The last 3 are all open plan (with archways) so can't even shut doors.
I plan to put curtains over the archways. Have already put a curtain over the front door. Anyone got any other ideas? Last year was absolutely freezing, I can't do that again!!

MarilynMonroe_2

kit wrote: »

Hi all.
Had my loft insulated today and 2 of my walls done with cavity insulation. Unfortunately the walls in the coldest part of my house (the extension) are made of wood so can't be done Not sure what else I can do in the extension, wood walls so no cavity insulation, flat roof so nothing I can do there, large windows which already have floor length curtains and radiators with silver stuff behind. Wouldn't be so bad if it was a small part of the house, but its over half of the floor space and houses my utility room, some of my hall, my lounge and dining room. The last 3 are all open plan (with archways) so can't even shut doors.
I plan to put curtains over the archways. Have already put a curtain over the front door. Anyone got any other ideas? Last year was absolutely freezing, I can't do that again!!

THink rude thoughts and when you blush you'll go all hot! Should warm you up a bit
I think the archway curtains are a great idea - what about throws over your couch at the ready?

Fruball

kit wrote: »

Hi all.
Had my loft insulated today and 2 of my walls done with cavity insulation. Unfortunately the walls in the coldest part of my house (the extension) are made of wood so can't be done Not sure what else I can do in the extension, wood walls so no cavity insulation, flat roof so nothing I can do there, large windows which already have floor length curtains and radiators with silver stuff behind. Wouldn't be so bad if it was a small part of the house, but its over half of the floor space and houses my utility room, some of my hall, my lounge and dining room. The last 3 are all open plan (with archways) so can't even shut doors.
I plan to put curtains over the archways. Have already put a curtain over the front door. Anyone got any other ideas? Last year was absolutely freezing, I can't do that again!!

Get a cross trainer... 10 minutes on that and not only will the air around you be pretty with little twinkling stars but you will be toasty warm too... and can double your mince pie and chocolate intake over Christmas with no risk of shrinking trousers

Confuzzled

Frugal wrote: »

Great list Annie.


My letterbox problem is slightly different - when its windy, the outside flap rattles - really annoying. I need to weight it with something - might use 2 pence pieces stuck on with superglue unless anybody else has any better ideas

how about 2 good sized wads of bluetak? in theory it should stick to one side or the other when the postie pushes it open with letters, if it sticks to the post too much you could only use it when it's really windy... i've used this solution for my bathroom trickle vent that constantly falls open, it rattles terribly and in a gale i really don't need to air the house by force :rotfl:

Confuzzled

Blue_Elephant wrote: »

I swear by the Epson printers, and Epson ink is expensive, but you can change one colour cartridge at a time rather than having to replace the lot when one colour runs out and you can get cheap "imitation" ink and I've never *touch wood* had any problems.

i have a brother DCP-135C all in one, only cost me about £50 a few years ago, all in ones are really cheap now and probably worth it for a teacher... anyway mine also allows you to change each colour as needed and i've used imitation inks since the lot that came with it ran out. i've had it for 2.5 years and have done a lot of printing on it as i'm a home educator. you'll find that brother and epson imitation cartridges are easy to come by and cheap, i get mine from a guy on ebay

prepareathome

MarilynMonroe How about curtaining on the walls, people do it for soundproofing now and years ago put hangings on the walls for warmth. Someone here mentioned putting cardboard on the wall, I think they said their son had a cold flat and had cut out shapes of guitars and put them all over the wall and it made a big difference. Putting a few layers of wall paper, not sure if that would work as insulation, but newspaper works as an insulator so why not wallpaper? Am sure there must be more inventive people on here that can help

tugrin

Kit - what about bubble wrap blue tacked to the wall and a 'throw'/blanket over the top - I use a staple gun to put fabric up- guess you could do that with the bubblewrap too. Theres always expanded polystyrene as well - sheet insulation which you could paint.