Preparing for Winter

toottifrootti

love all the ideas - have got thick curtains already and draught excluders but the worst bit in my flat is the floor - no carpets and cant afford any - any suggestions?? and some of the skirtings are missing from when the flat waas re-wired.

Sunnyday

toottifrootti wrote: »

love all the ideas - have got thick curtains already and draught excluders but the worst bit in my flat is the floor - no carpets and cant afford any - any suggestions?? and some of the skirtings are missing from when the flat waas re-wired.

If you have a wooden floor make a kind of papier mache from old newspapers and whilst wet push the mixture into the gaps in the floorboards, once dry i would collect cardboard boxes from the supermarket to use as a makeshift carpet as a temporary measure. Recyclable as well as insulating.

Good luck.
SD

Fruball

toottifrootti wrote: »

love all the ideas - have got thick curtains already and draught excluders but the worst bit in my flat is the floor - no carpets and cant afford any - any suggestions?? and some of the skirtings are missing from when the flat waas re-wired.

Can you try your local 'freecycle' for some carpet - I have seen people giving away decent sized pieces on our local site. Or rugs?

Ikea do lovely rugs - I picked one up for £7.99 and use it in the lounge when the kids have carpet picnics Then roll it away and store it.

toottifrootti

Thanks frugal and sunnyday - both brilliant ideas - my freecycle seems very small yet but even if i got 1 rug extra it would be a help - never thought of the cardboard and papier mache though - thanks

white_labrador

Would making rag rugs help at all? I haven't made any, but I have sometimes seen ones made in craft books and they looked great. The local library may have some books which tell you how, or you could look on the net. You use a firm piece of material for the base, and cut up strips of clothes or any fabric to hook into it. It can be a very cheap way of making floor coverings and environmentally friendly too, what with the recycling aspect.

ceridwen

toottifrootti wrote: »

love all the ideas - have got thick curtains already and draught excluders but the worst bit in my flat is the floor - no carpets and cant afford any - any suggestions?? and some of the skirtings are missing from when the flat waas re-wired.

Well - I recall from the 1970s budget books that there was a suggestion re patchwork carpet - ie making up a carpet from patches of carpet (like carpet squares sewn together in effect). I believe shops at that time used to give away old books of carpet samples if one asked - dont know if they still do.

Otherwise - there is a certain (pretty expensive) carpet shop near me - and I frequently see odd bits of carpet just literally thrown out on the pavement waiting to be taken off with the rubbish. Whether - in these "credit crunch" times they still do this I dont know - but 'twas only a matter of months ago I used to notice this first thing of a morning once a week. I would think the more expensive carpet shops are probably a better bit for carpet foraging than places like Carpetright - but you never know. Me - I'd be investigating for rubbish/skips outside them.

ceridwen

Hmmmm.....this website still mucking around on me - well the edit I was going to put in on my post above is:

Re this expensive carpet shop near me - the bits they throw out are often sizeable enough that 2 or 3 would do one of my smaller rooms.

One could always deal with the skirting board problem by thinking "1970s bathrooms" - ie the way they used to run the bathroom carpet up the sides of the bath - and run the carpet up the skirting board area.

Failing the possibility of doing retro hippychic - then put postcard up in a newsagents window for a couple of weeks offering "Good home to unwanted carpet" - make it humorous tone of voice. For an experiment I would be inclined to put one up in a shop in a poorer area and one in the poshest area here - should cover all angles as to why people might give you a carpet:D

There is also the possibility of offices nearby revamping and throwing out carpet - worth keeping an eye out for. Even in these credit crunch times too - there might still be a tendency for "office gods" when they take over a "patch of territory" and want to "put their stamp on it" to do totally unneccessary revamping just so it looks the way THEY want it to - in which case you might get some pretty new carpet - and anyways it will certainly be hardwearing.

sunflower76

ceridwen wrote: »

Well - I recall from the 1970s budget books that there was a suggestion re patchwork carpet - ie making up a carpet from patches of carpet (like carpet squares sewn together in effect). I believe shops at that time used to give away old books of carpet samples if one asked - dont know if they still do.

In our first 'proper' house we couldn't afford a stairs carpet so scrounged lots of old samples from the carpet shops. Some we were given and some we had to pay around 50p for but eventually we had one for each stair which we tacked down and made do with. When times were a little easier we decided to replace the squares with new samples but we never bothered with a full carpet as they were quite good enough really and visitors found them rather interesting.

BigMummaF

I'm an avid DIY show watcher & I'm almost certain they have used builders dust sheets to make rugs. They are--apparently--of reasonable price for the size & quality of material & you can paint on them to match your decor...probably adding a bit of boat varnish to seal & waterproof it.

The same stuff makes good curtains too.

mardatha

my first flat, I fitted carpet round the beds and furniture because I couldnt afford it and had to make do with hand outs from family. Everything looked great until you wanted to move the furniture.... I used an unwanted door as a huge coffee table --that covered a lot of space & we had the tv, radio, stereo, plants, even meals on it