Preparing for Winter V

SuzeQStan

Ye our sweep tried to raise prices by 25% (!!) last year and we looked elsewhere like many of their other clients and they backed down thankfully. They like everyone else have gone very expensive.  

fionaandphil

It's only £10 extra so will be £80 next year. Our wood is generally free and it saves us on the cost of oil so probably saves us more than that. We've been having it done for 20 years and it's only gone up £20 in all that time so I can't grumble too much.

Laura_Elsewhere

If you’ve ever seen a chimney fire, then you’ll know how vital it is to keep the chimney swept!! 

The last time I was somewhere with a fire and chimney, I had it initially inspected (entire flue and stack), certified and swept, and that was £150, and then having it swept after that was about £50. That was between 2000 and 2005, so it sounds like 80 quid as the new price is indeed pretty good! 
I cat-sat, for five years, ranging from a week to five months at a time, in a little cottage in the woods, a lodge-house for a ‘big hoose’ on a small estate. The actual renting tenants were Australian and warned me of the very expensive heating-oil costs and how much they got through, so I asked the owners for permission to get the fireplaces checked and working, and then I just gathered firewood in the surrounding woods and had very cheap oil-bills! Also, I greatly enjoyed the wood fires…

Cherryfudge

That sounds incredibly cosy @Laura_Elsewhere!

Laura_Elsewhere

Some blustery wet weather this weekend here in the W.Midlands and then high winds on Monday across much of the country… and have we got round to cleaning the outside glass of the windows in our topfloor flat? Nooo, of course we haven’t!! We’ll have to wait for a calmer weekend and get it done then- if we do it when it’s windy then half the flat gets redistributed by the whirling gusts coming in!! 

Hope everyone finds their preparations mean their homes stay cosy and comfortable in this first test of the season  

Cherryfudge

A small thing but... I've waterproofed a couple of pairs of trainers. I now need to buy more spray and do other footwear.

Green_hopeful

We are painting our window frames. It needed doing last year but we went straight from roasting hot summer weather to winter so didn’t get done. We have done 9 and a half windows on the ground floor. 2 and a half left to go. Waiting until I can cut back the rampant wisteria from the remaining windows before painting them. They are not too bad so hopefully I can get them done. First floor I have prepared 5 and a half big windows. A tiny bit of putty replacement tomorrow and then undercoat and top coat. The remaining ones have vegetation in the way but they are not in the worst condition. 

ET22

Hi @Green Hopeful. Your post made me think about people who still have wooden window frames. I was always under the impression that there are grants for double glazing etc and it was easy to upgrade and change them. That is what I thought anyway. 

Hodgepodge

Cherryfudge said:

A small thing but... I've waterproofed a couple of pairs of trainers. I now need to buy more spray and do other footwear.

Can you waterproof any trainers or are you re-proofing pairs that were waterproof previously?

Cherryfudge

Hodgepodge said:

Can you waterproof any trainers or are you re-proofing pairs that were waterproof previously?

These were both fabric or partly fabric and not previously waterproofed - I can't remember the name of the product but it was a spray-on water repellent. Quite pungent so I took them out of doors to spray. I have a separate one for suede and nubuck, I don't know if they are interchangeable. I also don't think it's guaranteed for dunking, but it's definitely helped on rainy days.