7 Easy Ways To Help Your Home Get Through Winter

7 Easy Ways To Get Your Home Through Winter

With the holidays having wrapped up it is a great time to start paying attention to some of those simple yet often-overlooked chores around the home. Some I'm sure you've already gotten to, while others have probably slipped your mind or haven't quite made their way onto your To-Do list yet. Here are 7 easy ways to help out your home through winter conditions.

1. Change Your Furnace Filter- I figured we'd start with an easy one here. This is something you could probably do every 3-6 months year round, sometimes even more frequently for older furnaces or any that you can see working hard for long periods at a time. Be careful what you put around your house too! My girlfriend had this little shelf-tower thing at an old condo we lived in and she routinely lined the shelves with all sorts of candles. I couldn't figure out why the furnace filter got SO DARK so quick, I mean I was changing the filter every month or every other month at one point. Come to realize, it was working hard filtering out all of that candle smoke for 4-6 hours a day! Be careful of where you operate your candles or incense.
2. Prepare Your Outdoor Faucets- This should be another one you probably have checked off your list already. You want to protect this faucet and the pipes inside from freezing and bursting. The first step will be to disconnect the hose or whatever attachment you have connecting your hose/apparatus to the spigot. If you are unable to manually turn off the water leading to the faucet itself you will probably still be alright. Dry off the spigot and if you want to wrap it in an old t-shirt or sock then feel free. Cover the faucet and whatever you wrapped it up in with a faucet cover/protector. They are made from foam, will usually cover the faucet and connect with the house, and they usually have a hard exterior that covers the foam. You can get them at any hardware store, as they'll usually be an end-cap item during the fall and winter season as the stores know that just about every home and building around will be needing one. Here is one that I personally use from Lowe's.
3. Check For Drafts- Doors and windows with drafts can lead to a loss of heat and a high energy bill. Take one of those incense candles or a piece of toilet paper, light it, and get close enough to the door and window edges to inspect what the smoke is doing. Is it swirling? Stagnant? Moving in one direction only? Swirling smoke can often be an indication that you have a draft problem. One way to address drafts under doors is to take an older towel and simply roll it and wedge it in the gap. This works great for doors that are used a bit less frequently. I mean how often are you really going out through that door tucked away in the the garage that leads into your backyard? (And please, use caution with the open flame test. We do not want to see your curtains going up. We want you to have an awesome and explosive 2019 but this is not what we mean by that.)
4. Be Mindful of Your Thermostat- The bulk of energy costs come from heating and cooling. It's easy to say you'll be more diligent with turning the thermostats down when you leave but we're all human and we all forget to do it at times! One thing you can always do, and this is a bit more practical in seldom used rooms in the house, put a laminated note about the light switch inside the room with a reminder to turn off the lights/turn down the heat. If your spare bedroom gets used for one week each December when your in-laws are in town you might not want it kept at 74 degrees year round. One additional tip here could be to contact your energy provider and ask if they have smart meters installed or if they can provide any additional tips beside just "remembering to turn it off".
5. Turn Down Your Water Heater- A lot of water heaters are set to a temperature that is much higher than what you actually need in order to run your appliances and shower. If your temperature is set to 140-150 degrees why not try it out at 120-130 instead and see if you can get by without the scalding shower once in a while. It could very well be a nice little reduction in price for your energy bill.
6. Insulate Your Windows- Windows can be insulated in a few different ways. And they don't necessarily have to look awful as a result either. You can apply weather stripping to protect against draft or leaks and there are a variety of types and materials available at your local hardware store. We prefer a synthetic weather stripping material and one that can be easily removed without ripping the paint off in the process. Additionally to adding the weather stripping, be sure to check areas where the windows or doors meet new surfaces. If you see a gap, feel free to add some caulking to it as long as you feel comfortable with the process.
7. Wear Layers- This might not be popular with those of you who like to walk around your houses in only your underwear and a tank top year round, but the truth of the matter is that wearing more clothes and layers is FREE. If you're sitting on the couch watching a show or a movie, how about adding a light blanket to cover your legs and toes? Going to be sitting down at the kitchen table to study for 2-3 hours this Sunday afternoon? Put on some thicker socks and some comfy sweats. You'd be surprised how well your energy bill will respond with the temperature down a couple of degrees throughout the day and night time. If you typically have the temperature up at night even, try turning it down a bit in exchange for an extra blanket or two on the bed. I've found that just by adding the blankets and keeping the air cool I almost always sleep and feel better in the morning.

Good luck getting your home ready to go as we are still navigating through these chilly temperatures. Have a few Easy Fixes you use to prepare for the winter? Add them in the comments!