Hello Dear Reader,
I love it when the BBC rings me! Tonight I am going to give my ten pence worth on winter money saving and how we can be a little more thrifty at Christmas.
This is a really expensive time of year, the children go back to school and it's an endless dip into family pockets for parties, presents, school trips and then it's Children in Need, then as soon as Pudsey is packed away for another year then it's Christmas! It can feel like a total financial drain. On top of that we are in for another really cold wet winter. That means dripping wet school shoes and school coats, muddy school uniforms, wet work clothes and shoes and the struggle to keep the house warm and dry.
So, here's what I will be sharing on the radio tonight.
Set a winter fuel budget - make sure you can have some heating, even if it's just for a few hours a day. Then, keep the warmth in. Take a look at the curtain heading tape and move the hooks 'up a level' and one the level below you can hook in thermal curtain linings. These can be used year after year and taken down in spring and put away in a drawer or top of the airing cupboard. You could just use large safety pins and pin a sheet behind that or a fleece blanket. These can taken down, washed and put away in spring.
Close your curtains - make sure you close your curtains every night. It amazes me when I can see in to houses lit up with their curtains open just leaking heat onto the street. Also, get a door curtain so you can save the heat you've paid so much for.
Get your boiler serviced! It's much cheaper to have it looked at now than call out an engineer on a wet Sunday afternoon with a call out charge and the parts which you had not budgeted for. It's always really good to budget for this and you can take our boiler insurance that will cover your heating and water system.
Heat the rooms you use - we don't heat the spare bedroom or our offices. My office is above the lounge and we leave the doors open down stairs so the heat permeates through the house.
Do you need to heat bedrooms? We don't heat ours but do use an electric blanket to warm our bed up for half an hour before we go to bed.
It might be obvious, but when at home, wrap up! We keep chunky jumpers in our lounge to put on in the evening if we feel chilly it's our go to. We also wear socks and slippers. I've even resorted to wearing our dressing gowns around the house, once they were referred to as house coats.
If you heat with solid fuel then you will pay a lot less if you buy in bulk. We buy a small lorry load of wood at a time and we pay a fraction than if we had bought nets of logs from the local shops. It amazes me when I see people buying wood that way. Coal is the same, you will pay so much less if you buy it in bulk instead of the odd bag here and there.
So, what can you do to winterise yourself and your home?
- Look out for thermal linings for your curtains.
- Hang your door curtains.
- Drape blankets or quilts over chairs for an easy wrap up or to place over legs
- Bulk buy your winter logs or coal
- Get your boiler services
- You could take out boiler insurance
- Get the electric blanket back on the bed.
- Dig out the warm socks and thick jumpers for wearing around the house
Over to you, what advice would you give to listeners who want to live comfortably and keep the costs down this winter.
Until tomorrow,
Love Froogs