Getting Ready for Winter

The past few days have brought the first taste of chilly days and colder nights. The temperature change was rather shocking to the body, as the lead in days were oddly warm, more like July in our area. The huge difference (80+ degrees one day, and 35 degrees the next) makes one know that its time to start doing something about the tasks that need completed before the snow falls.

The tomato plants that I want to try to save needed covering the past few nights. I'd forgotten how much I get annoyed with having to do that. I am working on a solution to the problem, building some "hoop houses" over the top of the plants I most want to nurture for a few more weeks. Hoops are easy to build. All it takes are some flexible plastic pipe, some kind of stake to slip both ends of the pipe onto, and some plastic to drape over the series of ribs created by staking a series of bowed pipes over the various plants. I have to admit, however, that this is my first time trying this myself. I selected the tomato plants that seem to be doing the very best at this point in time, and so I will be trying to keep them going into November. My goal is until possibly Thanksgiving, however some really cold days and lots of snow can undermine that hope.

With the price of gas and heating fuel, the thing that has most been on my mind is solving the winter heat situation. From my past experiences living in Montana, I do have some skills that I am "pulling back out" so to speak, and will apply to my current place. One is getting a woodstove installed...hopefully...if local code and the insurance doesn't prevent this process. Another option is to build my greenhouse again on the front deck (the one I used for raising my plants), and vent the warm air it generates into the livingroom. That is fairly simple to do, and so it will be a piece of my projects. A third option is to create a barrier to our upstairs to hopefully hold some of the heat in the areas we "most live in". That means installing a sliding door on the stairs. We have one, so its just the work to get it in. Other things that we can do include making sure that windows have good seals, that windows that can generate some solar heat are accentuated to do so...my husband wants to try putting up some black felt, and then again to prevent heat loss, sewing up some window quilts and installing them.

Lots of activities...I have no idea if we will have the physical energy to get it all done before the first snow. At least knowing what to do...having the list....gives a starting place. I guess its more of deciding which place to start.

(I tend to get too many going at once!)

Of course on top of all those things is just the day-to-day chores, cleaning house being one that is the perpetual task of never-ending work. So....guess its time to get back at it on this Sunday afternoon.

S~