BATTENING THE HATCHES...

Well, it is officially Fall now... on the calendar and by the temperature in my house last night. I was out with my girlfriends having dinner and when I got home, it was only 63F (my thermostat is old and is only in Fahrenheit).

Needless to say, it was freezing! Even my dog was chilly. The hairs on her back were standing up a bit. She'd probably been sleeping all evening while I was out - as she is wont to do - so no movement = no increase in body heat.

I was forced to turn the heat on. On Sept. 29th!!!! GAWD! In September I needed the heat on. That just sucks big time. It was just for a few hours and I turned it down overnight, but when the temp outside is 2 or 3C (yeah I know that is Celsius but that is what the weather icon on my taskbar tells me, so the thermostat and weather thingie are not on the same page, let alone in the same era), you gotta get the furnace pumping to take that chill out of the air. Especially when that air in indoors!

So today I replaced my old thermostat with a new, 5+1+1 day programmable one. All new-fangled and computerized. So now the house will cool down and heat up automatically and it should (as they claim) save me money in the long run.

I also replaced the door sweep on my door. I would say front door but it is on the side of the house. And it is the only swing-type door I have. As the only other door to the outside is the sliding patio type. So I got that freshly sealed to prevent cold air from wiggling it's way under the door in the dead of winter. The weather stripping around the door frame is in good shape.

To see the state of affairs above me, I climbed up into my attic today. Wanted to see what the insulation situation was like. Turns out it is that blown in grey stuff. It is pretty uneven, so I think I will buy some and spread it around to thicken things up. Have to figure out how much to put in there. The local hydro company has some pretty good tips on their website for this. They say you should have the attic insulated to R50. Will have to measure and figure out what I have now, so I know how much to add.

I also am going to make a rigid foam cover for my one and only basement window. It is an original, wooden framed window. All the other windows in the house were replaced with nice, decent quality vinyl windows a few years ago, so no worries there. Why they didn't included the basement one is beyond me. One more would have added about $300 to the total bill. So I think I will replace it in the spring, when funds are little freer (hopefully). For the winter, however, it will get a nice, thick layer of rigid foam insulation to keep the cold at bay.

Since I just moved into this house in July, I really don't have any idea what it will be like in the winter. I am certain it can't be as bad as the house I rented last winter, where there was old sawdust for insulation (the damn thing was built in 1900!) so it cost me over $300/month to heat the thing to a chilly 15C. I wore so many layers of clothes last winter INSIDE that it was friggin' ridiculous! I hated that house.....

But this house I really like. I have been in it for two months now and have done a little bit of decorating. I have a huge list of things planned to do in the future, but those will be tackled slowly and over a number of years to help defray the cost.

Unless, of course, I win a bit of something on the lottery.....