Preparing for Winter

mardatha

We had a frost this morning and now the sun's gone down its quite nippy. Time to get the woollies out !

Confuzzled

MRSTITTLEMOUSE wrote: »

I discovered fleece a couple of years ago and don't know what I'd do without it over the cold weather.
I found myself collecting more and more stuff PJs dressing gown,socks hot water bottle covers,blankets ect,ect and I just find it so comfy and snuggly it realy made the cold weather more comfortable.
Best thing of all is how easy it washes and dries.
Just could'nt manage without it now.

another nice thing about fleece is that it's made from recycled plastic! see the snippet from wikipedia

'Polar fleece (also known as microfleece or micrafleece), usually referred to simply as "fleece," is a soft napped insulating synthetic wool fabric made from PET or other synthetic fibres. One of the first forms was Polar Fleece created in 1979 by Malden Mills, now Polartec LLC., a new, light and strong pile fabric meant to mimic and in some ways surpass wool. Fleece has some of wool's finest qualities but weighs a fraction of the lightest available woolens.'

whilst i wouldn't encourage anyone to use extra plastic to make fleece it's nice to know that one of our problem children for the ecosystem can be made into something very useful.

i know that they make wool insulation from homes, i wonder if they could do the same with fleece?

and speaking of fleece and home... i'm in my new flat, sitting under a fleece to take the chill off. i love the flat overall but all of the double glazed windows are in wooden frames and 3 of them are quite warped so they don't close properly. i'll call the letting agent on tuesday to ask them to put in some insulation to resolve the gap issue (i can see daylight through one and saw the curtains being blown all about!) for now though i've taken strips of brown parcel wrapping paper i got as a filler in an online order and folded it into strips then used a butter knife to press it snugly into the gaps til it can be sorted. that made a huge difference quite quickly, especially the other day when we were having gale force winds (70mph!)

i happily report that i managed not to turn the heat on at all at the old flat and here i turned it on the first night as i said i would to see that it was working ok. unfortunately i forgot to actually switch two of them on at the wall until nearly 5am so i left them on the next night too (plus that was gale night!) that helped take the chill off the house and now i think i can manage without the heat a while longer at least so they are all off.

now i just have to figure out how everything works as it's all old and i can't find any instruction booklets for anything, the heater in the bedroom is quite odd, not your normal storage heater and whilst it was def running the first night (very loud noise) i never got any heat out of it as i couldn't figure it out. saying that though i think i shall probably just leave the door open and use the heat from the hall way heater instead as it belts it out (that will be where my airer goes!) and i have to leave that one on to heat the bathroom anyway.

i think in all but the coldest winter days that should suffice, i actually woke up too hot the first night when the hall one was working but the bedroom one wasn't and as winter gets closer i will add more duvets to lie on top off (almost wish it were cold enough now it's going to be soo cozy!) doing that should make it plenty warm enough for sleeping and if worse comes to worse the heater works in the other room so i can snuggle in with the wee one!

i also plan to find the make and model numbers for everything in question and search online for instruction booklets, failing that i could call the makers for advice, sadly my letting agents, whilst good at many things seem clueless about these sort of devices in the properties they let as i discovered with my old property!

i also got to meet the downstairs lady... not elderly so i doubt i'll get tons of free heat but she's probably at least 15 years my sr so maybe she's starting to feel the cold

one thing i'm a little concerned with is there is no door to the living room, it's been removed. i suppose it's good in a way because this means that the heat levels will remain fairly balanced between the living room heater and the hall heater and no rush of cold air when my daughter inevitably throws the door wide open and leaves it that way as she goes to the loo 10 times a day :rotfl:

as far as i can tell the side of the house where my entrance is is south facing, wish it had been along the front or back of the house but the hall does stay very warm when the sun is shining. i suppose this helps as even when i go down the unheated stairs it's not felt really cold (theres a door at the top of the landing just past the coat cupboard so that keeps the cold out of the flat) i may well use that for the airer during the day and the hall on the other side of the door for the airer at night, that should keep the clothes out of the way the easiest and make the best use of (free or something that would be used anyway) i should think. now i have to get to argos to get an airer!

ohh a thought did occur to me, the flat has a rather good sized electric fireplace :eek: normally i wouldn't use these on pain of death for the cost but if things got bad i could move it into any room needed and use it to take the nip out of the air

i won't need to make any draught excluders for the doors (might have to for the windows!) as they all make a delightful swishing noise as they rub snugly against the carpets. i shall probably put some bubblewrap behind the wee lace curtain on the door between my upstairs landing and my hall way and in my bathroom for certain as it's always a touch cold in there. the bathroom does have one of these small heaters near the ceiling but i'm loathe to use it as i know how costly they are so i'll leave the door shut til it's too cold to bear then leave the door open a bit to take advantage of the hall heater.

once i figure out the timer and how each radiator works (they're all different!) etc etc i think i can manage quite well. i'm slightly irritated by two things though. the first is that i can't turn the clock off on the cooker. i can't seem to find a switch for the cooker at all (it's one of those glass top cookers with the convection oven) and i can't see anything near the clock to turn it off either. the other is that i can't find the meter to read! might be outside, but it's not in any of the three cupboards i've checked. i've been unwell since i moved so i haven't done as much money saving activity as i'd have liked right off the bat but i'll call the letting agent on tuesday (monday is a bank holiday right?) and ask about some of these things

anyway, that's what i've been up to (besides wading through a sea of boxes!) i'm happily and realtively cozily settling into the new place

shaz_mum_of__2

pleased you have kind of settled in confuzzled ........................not a bank holiday here but not sure about north of the border....................just checked nothing in my diary even for scotland

MoneyQueen

Anyone who has bought fleece from Ikea, do they do them in many colours in the store? I have checked the website and they only seem to have the cheapest ones in blue. -
IRMA Throw -£1.69

Thanks

geordie_joe

Confuzzled wrote: »

another nice thing about fleece is that it's made from recycled plastic! see the snippet from wikipedia

I don't want to be pedantic, but the actual phrase used in Wiki is

"It can be made partially from recycled plastic bottles"

Your phrase makes it sound like it is always, and entirely made from recycled plastic.

I don't want any greenies getting the idea that they'll save the planet if they stop buying wool products and switch to fleece. :eek:

Rummer

I made a mini curtain for a mini window in my kitchen and I was tickled pink with it! Lined it with an old towel (which can't be seen inside or outside) and it has made a huge difference to the draught. OH tried to put the lounge curtains up but the wall kept crumbling when he was drilling so we are going to leave it today and try again when he is calmer!

Confuzzled

shaz_mum_of__2 wrote: »

pleased you have kind of settled in confuzzled ........................not a bank holiday here but not sure about north of the border....................just checked nothing in my diary even for scotland

thanks shaz... now i'm confused though as a few places said they'd be closed or have less hours on monday oct 5th when i went out on saturday that's why i asked

well guess i can call them tomorrow then rather than tuesday!

i also need to ask them for instructions for that cooker... i had a devil of a time cooking a casserole tonight, it thought convection ovens were supposed to cook things too quickly... took 2 hours to cook my casserole and i must have tried nearly every setting they had (i detest pictograms, give me words damnit!) this one does seem new enough i should be able to find soemthing online about it at least....

it did keep the house warmer at least

Confuzzled

geordie_joe wrote: »

I don't want to be pedantic, but the actual phrase used in Wiki is

"It can be made partially from recycled plastic bottles"

Your phrase makes it sound like it is always, and entirely made from recycled plastic.

I don't want any greenies getting the idea that they'll save the planet if they stop buying wool products and switch to fleece. :eek:

i certainly did not mean to imply that, though i must point out i did explicitly state 'whilst i wouldn't encourage anyone to use extra plastic to make fleece it's nice to know that one of our problem children for the ecosystem can be made into something very useful.' for the very reason you mention above!

i'd never want to encourage anything of that sort, i'm taking an OU course on sustainable development and hoping to do a degree programme for it starting next year too!

ktpie

MoneyQueen wrote: »

Anyone who has bought fleece from Ikea, do they do them in many colours in the store? I have checked the website and they only seem to have the cheapest ones in blue. -
IRMA Throw -£1.69

Thanks

The Irma ones are just in blue, there is more of a choice of colours for the Polarvide which are a bit more expensive, £2 something, that is why I used those instead, I wanted white instead of blue.

We've lit the fire in our stove for a few evenings now and have lit it this morning as well, seemed pretty cold first thing this morning.

kingshir

sashanut wrote: »

Hi all

But I thought I better tell you about something that might be of interest if you have an open fire grate that is not continually in use.
http://www.chimney-balloon.co.uk/

which we have just fitted this morning. Now I know you don't all have pigeon problems, but of course it should act to prevent cold air from coming down the chimney - a consideration for me as I sit next to the fireplace even when it's not lit. Apparently if you forget its up there & light a fire, it just shrivels up & you've lost £20 or so; however if you deflate it you can use it again. As I said, it's only just been fitted, but I'll report back on it's effectiveness (or not!). ATM they also have free delivery & 10% off as well - I have no affiliation with them, just thought it might help someone else.:D

In the rooms where the open fires aren't used regularly, I push an old pillow up to block it AND THEN I leave a note in the grate to remind me that it is blocked up:D I take them out in the summer and I've been doing this for 20+ years without any problems. I think the rooms get enough airflow (when the chimneys are blocked) what with the drafts and air vents:rotfl: