Monday, October 12, 2009

Preparing For Winter....Ready Or Not!

I'm not looking forward to it. I'm not really ready for it. Those of you not heading for the warm climate of points south know what I am talking about.....WINTER. We can't avoid it, though, it is all a part of nature's cycle of growth and regeneration.

It was 28 degrees in Tumwater yesterday morning. Brrrrrrr. Our heat pump is reluctant to warm us up at those low temperatures, but we still had the propane furnace to keep us cozy. With the "Grands" being here Sunday morning we didn't want the place to be too cold for them. When we are here alone, we can turn the thermostat down low at night and rely on our electric blankets for added warmth. When we've got the little people here, that do not keep their covers on, it is a different story. This morning the low temperature was only about 34 degrees and the heat pump did it's job.

Even with the onset of winter looming ahead, my little African Violet is still blooming. Given enough light, water, and fertilizer it will bloom almost constantly for me. It is the only house plant hold-over from our sticks-n-bricks home. When this one bites the dust....house plants are history for me. It's kind of cute, and for now I'll keep it. Bruce went outside this weekend and put the insulating wrap on our water hose. We bought this at Home Depot last winter and it kept the hose from freezing even when we never had a high temperature above 30 degrees all of January.
Last winter we also bought this space heater at the Home Depot. It really helped out when we only had 30 amp service. It took less to operate than our electric heat system (when it would work, that is). The main savings with the space heater was not having to use the propane furnace. This little heater keeps our main living space nice and warm. It is a Lasko brand and has a thermostat and will oscillate also.
So far, we've done all we need to do in preparation for old man Winter. Hopefully, we won't need the snow shovel like we did last year!!!
But hey!.....we only have 75 more days until we can head south for 2 months.....but who is really counting? (us)
Until next time.....so long for now!


3 comments:

Gypsy said...

I love my Lasko heater also. It is oscillating but I haven't yet tried any of the thermostat settings. Aren't they wonderful when you just want to warm your little area up and not heat the whole RV? I have about 3 more weeks of northern cold to go and I'll be thinking about ya. Stay warm.

Jerry and Suzy said...

Even down here in the desert around Benson, AZ we get some awfully cold nights and early mornings. We have a little DeLonghi space heater with thermostat settings and oscillations, and we love it!

You still have an African violet, how nice. Believe it or not, we just bought ... a cactus garden, about 14 inches round, with 8 or 10small cactus plants in it! Why? 'Cause when we travel away from desert, we wanna see cactus!

Phyllis said...

What a small small world. I was just looking at the list of bloggers you follow. Karon (Discovery Travelers is a regular poster on the WW Rv site.

Also, we met Joe and Sherri (Somewhere in time) earlier in the year when we were visiting Len's family in Louisiana. Great people!

Phyllis