Winter.

[jansman]

Well, last night the temperature went down to minus 1.9 degrees in N Ireland. You can smell the change in the air! Nick Dutch mentioned the W word earlier too!
So, here at Chez Jansman we are getting a few things sorted. Batteries for torches and lanterns( thanks Nick- nearly missed that one), plenty of solid fuel for the stove, has for the back- up stoves.
Tomorrow I shall lag the pipes and cistern in the outside toilet(yes we still have one ,and it saves a 3day camel ride upstairs ) the generator has sufficient fuel in case of power cuts -short term. That is for the freezers tbh.
The one thing I always do though, is to bring in a couple of 5 gallon water barrels and pop them in our walk-in pantry so they do not freeze. When we first moved here, we had a weather event that knocked out power and water for three days. Power was no problem but water was. Boiling snow ain't fun. That was 24 years ago, I will grant you, but I can never say never.

[hobo]

Thanks for the reminder J!

I've been recharging everything this weekend (it was in the diary to do it!).
Haven't found the several tubs of night lights so far (for the flowerpot heaters I trialled last year). I'll look harder today.
We still have all of last winter's wood under tarps out back - we only used a fraction last year
I've still got to empty our freezers of allotment fruit and turn it into jam and wine. We only use a couple of leisure batteries hooked up to solar panels for additional recharging in power outs.

[redskies]

If you get bored of jam and wine, try fruit leathers; wonderful things, and they keep for aaaaages!

We'll be making our gale season/winter preparations in the near future. Although this year, we'll be leaving spuds growing in the tyre stacks, just to see what happens. We tend to keep batteries charged and the power cut kit handy, as we regularly lose power, mostly it's moving stuff and tying things down/to the garden fence!

[Devonian]

Tomorrow I shall lag the pipes and cistern in the outside toilet

I find it amazing that you've been there for 24 years and you haven't already lagged and protected the outside water pipes

[nickdutch]

If you get bored of jam and wine, try fruit leathers; wonderful things, and they keep for aaaaages!

Thats a good point actually. I haven't made them for ages and some apple and date crumbly gooey bits wouldn't go a miss if I was to add a sprinkle of cinnamon (which reduces blood sugar and delivers the glucose better into the body cells thus speeding up energy, as well as reducing the blood sugar issue) to them or indeed turn them into biscuits with ground nuts and seeds, using linseed to bind it and increase the digestive effect as well as peanut or walnut for the healthy fat content and the seeds too to add yet more fibre and protein and thus to slow the release of sugar into the bloodstream (glycemic index) and keep me going for longer. not really for long term food storage mind, but more for fun and for a change, and now I have the great fun 600W nutribullet blender, rustling something up would be a breeze.

Morrisons is relatively cheap for fruits (pineapple at just 69p) and the pound shops do pitted dates, but make sure that they are properly pitted, you don't want any stone in them when you shove them in the blender.

I think H+B have a "penny sale" on so organic pumpkin seeds (great for encouraging internal parasites to let go of the digestive system walls) could be relatively cheap.

So blend it all up with water and then pour it on olive oiled greaseproof paper the flat tray on the dehydrator and let it run all day.


Damn, I know a lot more about foods than I used to !!!

[redskies]

We do ours in the oven. Lowest temperature setting, and we prop the door open with a wooden spoon. Only takes a few hours

[DustyDog]

Aye Jansman, if you believe old wives tales, this winter is supposed to be a hard one, according to local farmers, a good silage (it was) means a hard winter, bumper crop of Rowan berries, the same etc. Well, living in the highest market town in the country our winters are good anyway, so down to prepping; i'm busy cutting and chopping logs for the three log burners we have, will get a top up of oil in next month or so, making sure the freezer is full, don't have a back up gennie, wish we did, ££££'s not spare enough for that, also wish could build something like Yorkshire Andy, the battery back thingy he has built, or get a old Lister Diesel and build auxilary power source, just for freezers, mobile charging, that kind of thing. As always, buying extra tinned and dried food etc, winter tyres on car, the list does go on.

[jansman]

Tomorrow I shall lag the pipes and cistern in the outside toilet

I find it amazing that you've been there for 24 years and you haven't already lagged and protected the outside water pipes

What I should have said, is that the pipes need re-lagging. Back then the plumber used hessian sacking strips. Now of course it is that foam tubing. Nevertheless, the old lagging has stood the test of time.

[Yorkshire Andy]

Remember lagging only slows the freeze process to prevent bursts low level background heating is a must

[dizzydays]

Tomorrow I shall lag the pipes and cistern in the outside toilet

I find it amazing that you've been there for 24 years and you haven't already lagged and protected the outside water pipes

Ah thanks for that....took me right back to Victoria Wood 'Lets Do It' aka 'the ballad of Freda and Barry' - 'you know as well as I do that the pipes need lagging....'

For those too young to remember that classic I advise a quick look on youtube.

DD