Tuesday, January 01, 2013

Holding back the cold.

I shrink-wrapped my front door.

Yes, you read that right.

My house is 100 years old, with front doors that are very likely 100 years old also.  Energy efficient they are not.  Single pane of glass, door frame as tight as my size 13 shoes on size 7 feet.  Yes, I’ve put weather stripping on.  Nothing seems to work.

But I don’t want to get rid of these doors, they were made back in the day when doors were ornamental, not just a pre-fab rectangle made to keep the heat in.  They’re classics.

But I’m really tired of my living room always being cold, no matter how high the heat is set.  So with the leftover piece of window plastic I used to insulate the back porch, a couple of days ago I wrapped my front door.  Tight as a drum.

Yeah, that means it is useless for the winter, but that’s ok.  I have a second front door in the spare room that I can use to get the newspaper and mail.

And now my living room stays toasty warm.

3 comments:

21 Wits said...

You are so wise, and warm now! Hooray for us, our temps have risen to zero degrees! Imagine that, but I don't even want to know what our wind chill is... P.S. totally a woman comment, but I just love the shine on your front porch. Is it just wet? Or is that natural? I love it!

Lisa Shafer said...

I have to put foam board in several of my windows for the winter. The house is a lot darker, but it's also warmer and QUIETER.

Max Sartin said...

Karen - Zero? Congrats. But the wind chill, I heard that can be a killer - literally. My sister lived in your neck of the woods for a few years and told me they never closed the schools because of too much snow. They did, though, close them because of "Life Threatening Wind-Chill". As she described it, so cold your kids could freeze to death waiting for the bus. Brrrrrr.
The shine on the porch was because of the rain.
Lisa - maybe you should leave the foam board up on the windows even in the summer, at least on the west side of the house.