So, are you using your central heating gas or electric ? My heating is on at the moment for a couple of hours, then I’ll turn off till a little later . My lounge is warm, but upstairs gets cold when it’s off as i use my gas fire in the evening . My smart meter is hitting £7 a day if heating on all the time . Of course im grateful for my heating allowance but this costing isnt sustainable for me .
I visited a friend the other day they are very well off a big beautiful house but cor blimey it was blinking freezing in there . A tiny elec fire on in the corner but it must have been minus on the thermostat. What is the point of this discomfort ?
I feel for the young families and bathing children cause its freezing outside
This old body is now wearing a vest , long sleeve t shirt , thick jumper, and a heavy thick cardy im thinking of putting a scarf round my neck too . Nah , on second thoughts ill turn the heating back on , if i die then the kids can pay the bill
Oh i would so love a wood burner Muddy , snug as a bug . In my other life i had a bigger house and an open fire place . I loved lighting the fire i never complained about cleaning it out because it gave me so much pleasure . Never a problem to light either . So wish i had one in my little house to.
We have the heating on for a couple of hours in the morning. If still feeling cold after the central heating is turned off, we might turn on one of the ceramic electric radiators for a while.
Other than that, we dress warmly with two or three layers of warm clothing. So many people shown on TV saying they are cold are only wearing light clothing or even T shirts. Why don’t they put a jumper on?
I have a furry Onesie over the top of a thermal vest and long johns for evening wear. Very good at retaining body heat.
If visitors are coming, the heat goes on regardless of cost.
We set the thermostat for it to come on in the night if the temperature inside goes down below 15, don’t want to die of hypothermia! Other than that, it’s off at night
In the morning I turn it on for a while to heat the house to be about 19, then it goes off. We wear fleeces and jumpers and if we’re moving around we don’t really notice if it’s a bit chilly
Then I put it back on at about 6pm to warm it up for when we’re sat down in the evening The heat rises up so I leave the bedroom doors open to warm them up a bit (we don’t have the radiators on in the bedrooms)
We’ve got Oodies we wear for TV watching in the evening, big thermal socks and I put our hot water bottles in our beds
We’re not stupid about it and we don’t let ourselves get cold, if it’s too bad the heating goes on
But we are careful and try to cut down as much as possible because it is so expensive now
I live in a modern centrally heated flat, and a couple of years go, just before The Lockdown, the housing association installed new more efficient boilers and improved the insulation, including insulating & cladding the outside; there already was double glazing
So the place is about as well heated & prepared & efficient as you could expect
I put the heating on for an hour or two in the morning and that lasts for most of the day, but I usually turn it on again in the early evening for an hour or so and that lasts into the night.
I used to do a lot of hiking & camping, in summer and winter, so I have loads of warm clothes including down filled hut slippers, body warmers, thick wool socks, fleece jerseys, jackets, and trousers/pants, thermal T shirts, and all the rest of it
I’ve lost weight this year so recently I tried on my old wool jerseys and I could fit into all of them, ranging from fine lambs wool to thick Norwegian
My bedding includes a down filled duvet, blankets, and I have a hot water bottle.
And my hiking experience has taught me about keeping warm, well fed, and so on.
Sometimes if there’s nothing on TV or I don’t feel lively I just get into bed with a mug of tea and a book, in the evening and occasionally during the day
I must get a V shaped pillow or something
I see advice for older people to live in one room during cold weather, well wrapped, with a flask and so on - my flat is small so that’s effectively what i’m doing
My open plan lounge has open stairs so all the heat goes up onto the landing so rarely does the thermostat reach it temperature, so ive put up a long net curtain its not great but it does retain the heat a little longer in the lounge . I might get a heavier weight curtain but i will need a proper curtain rail attached to the stairs and ceiling.
Im amazed that some of you say after only a couple of hrs heat on in the morning your house stays warm till the evening . My house is insulated well in the loft and has wall insulation which was put in 40 yrs ago but would never stay warm till evening. You are so lucky . Maybe i need to get better wall insulation
@susan_m It’s important to isolate/restrict/control air movement around the house
So yes to shutting doors and so on, but in your case do what you can to fit extra, and thicker curtains or even a blanket as a temporary measure in winter
You might even think about some kind of folding screen wall for the future, a bit like some houses that have long living rooms extending right from the front to the back of the house
I remember as a boy helping Dad to fit draft excluding tape around the doors, and we always had a curtain on the back of the doorway, and a sausage along the bottom
the lady who does the Prime of Midlife YT channel has tips on saving money and insulation, including fitting bubble wrap on to windows.
Plus all the usual stuff about proper clothes, eating well, etc.
My flat is on the first (American second) floor and it is noticeably colder when I go downstairs to the hall & front door
In fact I use a downstairs utility cupboard as an extra fridge or pantry
Heating comes on at 8:00am until 10:00am set at 20c then it reduces to 19c until 5:00pm when it comes on at 20c until 10:30pm…That’s the plan anyway…But recently in this cold snap I turn it up to 21c at 8:00am and it will remain there until 5:00pm…It then gets turned up to 22c until 10:30pm while we watch TV. Because nobody is opening doors or windows it usually remains quite warm during the night due to good insulation, but the heating, which is set at 17c never comes on at night. I would rather spend money on heating and eating bills than on subscription TV, smartphones, and gadgets…The older I get, the more I hate the cold. Probably due to heart problems and medication. Keeping warm usually starts with stoking the boiler, five star fuel in the belly…
We still have an open fire in the Den and it’s great it also heats the water, with the back boiler. It’s the old system that was never taken out when the oil central heating was put in. We don’t have gas this far north in many homes it’s all electric or oil heating. I put it on first thing for an hour to take the chill off and himself to get the fire going while I’m at the pool for my lengths.
I also have one of those hooded fleece blankets, they are fantastic, this is my 2nd year with it.
I don’t know why but the cold weather doesn’t bother me. Maybe it was because I used to live hills in Scotland. We did have just one log fire. We even did the Bushman saw to cut trees. That was my job.
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