the diminishing pile

The renovation project that I started 3 years ago was more than just a house renovation project.  It was also a lifestyle renovation project to some extant.

Living in the country in the Northeast requires a large carbon footprint if you don't work to shrink it.  First of all we have to drive a lot.  My wife works 25 miles away, and my other job (besides renovator/homemaker) is 10 miles away.  The nearest commercial center for provisions is also 10 miles away.  We try to limit our driving by carpooling and bicycling whenever possible but there's no getting around burning a lot of gasoline.

Heating our home also requires a lot of energy.  When we started renovating the house I made the decision to install a wood stove, hoping to supplement the heat provided by the fossil fuel furnace.  I'm happy to have made the move to wood, but only by doing it did I learn the amount of work it takes to rely on wood heat.

Once we got used to using the wood stove, we decide to use it as our primary heating source.  This past winter I kept the thermostat for the furnace at 62 degrees fahrenheit and kept a fire going in the wood stove whenever we were home and not sleeping.  The rooms near the wood stove were always cozy and with the installation of my air recirculating fan and ductwork, the other rooms stayed warmish.

Burning wood has saved us a lot in oil fuel costs and helps to decrease our carbon footprint considerably.  As winter turns to spring, though, I'm eager to take a break from loading wood into the barn and splitting it up.  Sometimes the wood gets wet too, and there's nothing as frustrating as trying to get a fire started on a cold morning with wood that's a little wet or hasn't been quite seasoned enough.

And as the neatly stacked piles of wood dwindle, the empty rows remind me of the splitting and stacking that comes with the warm weather.  Wood work chores leaves less time for leisure but there's not many jobs more honest than working for your winter warmth.

handyman