This year's Freeze Yer Buns Challenge is well under way and the temperatures around here are certainly getting low. Not low, like Fargo low, just low for around here. Which means it's time to decide what to set the heat on for the day and night. Since we've all been struggling with the flu, we've been keeping it at a balmy 70 degrees, which seems totally decadent after freezing our buns off the last two years. At night we lower it considerably and the house is kept about 58. We have a wool blanket that keeps us warm at night (the down blanket is still too hot for this time of year) and our bed warmers if things get a little nippy.
The last few nights were the first ones that my kids were interested in sleeping with their own bed warmers. I didn't have any spare ones, so I gave Henry my leftover silk lavender eye-mask that I made for gifts last year. It's filled with lavender and lentils and it's small so it works perfectly for him. He's in love with the little satchel and, not too surprisingly, Emma was immediately jealous. Not having anything else for her, I fashioned an emergency bed warmer right at bedtime. I gave her the choice of dried rose petals or lavender and which kind of sock (Christmas-themed, of course). I spent a few minutes assembling the lavender and rice sock, heated it up, and gave it to her. She didn't like it. It was too "stinky".
So, I made her another one, this time with no lavender in it (I saved the other one for myself :), heated it up and gave it to her. She didn't like it. It was too "hot". I suggested just leaving it in her room, but she was getting upset about it and apparently, the sock was too scary. So, one-half hour later, she finally went to bed. With no bed warmer. But, that's okay, because her room is the warmest one in the house. Kids. I tell ya.
What are you doing to keep warm at night? Do you keep the heat up, sleep with a ton of blankets, have an electric blinky, go to bed wearing your ski gear?
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Downunder we've never latched onto the central heating idea, and I refuse to have an electic blanket or to have a heater running overnight, so I just pile on the blankets, fill a hottie, put on my warm pjs, and if it's really cold wear my beanie :] I'm a fairly warm person anyway, so I usually throw half it off before I wake up freezing haha
I sleep better in a cool (but not icy) room, so I do okay in winter. I have an old hospital cotton flannel blanket that I found at a church rummage sale, which I place on top of the fitted sheet. I cover myself with the top sheet and an old quilt. For some reason, laying on the flannel sheet is warmer than loads of top layers! (I live in New England near the Atlantic. Winter gets pretty cold here.)
I'm glad to hear you are all doing better! Best wishes!
We sleep with a ton of blankets, surrounded by bed curtains, in tons of clothes, with our baby between us. Toasty, once we get it warmed up!
My #1 must-have is a pair of socks on my feet. The warmer the better. It has been cold at night, but so far we're just staying fine -- I don't know if it's better health, getting used to it, new memory-foam mattress or what. I also sleep with a pillow between me and the edge of the bed that is closest to the cold wall, and I think that provides some good insulation. Midway through the night a warm dog usually replaces the pillow. :)
I bundle my oldest son (almost 2) up in a onesie, shirt, pants and a sleeper over it. A hat on really cold nights. I throw a blanket on him too, but he always kicks it off, so it's more for practice than anything else :)
For myself, I bring the baby to bed with me. Infants are HEAT MACHINES! My husband just piles on the blankets, hat and socks.
A very helpful thing, is I lay a thick comforter on the bed and tuck it under like a fitted sheet. I don't know why mattresses seem to retain cold, but they do.
We have had our heat on in the mornings and at night for the last month or so, which reminds me I have to get a meter read this weekend.
I am ready to turn the heat down 1 degree for all the day programs and 2 degrees for the night program. My girls and I are blanket people. We love our blankets. My oldest has her cosy - a fleece sleeping sack (no zipper) my mother sewed for her (because she is a toss and turn kinda gal and then a ton of blankets on top. My youngest outgrew her cozy so we need to make her a new one. This with a ton of blankets keeps them warm. I also sleep on a blanket which helps keep me warm and toasty.
We are considering an electric space heater, because we can heat just the living room (where we spend a considerable amount of time) rather than the whole house. This would allow me to turn down the heat in general and keep eveyone feeling toasty warm. DH has one up in the attic because it has no heat, and the days when the girls have been home or home sick he brings it down, closes off the livnig room and the girls are toasty warm and happy.
It hasn't been cold enough yet for me to need the heat. Additionally, I don't know what I can set it to; the instructions say it can only be set to between 72° and 76°, but trying it just now, it went down into the 60s. I'll have to email management.
I sleep on top of a thin blanket, which is over the fitted sheet, and under a down-filled comforter. When it was really cold last month I would microwave two rice packs and take them to bed with me-- they stayed slightly warm until morning. I'm thinking of getting a flannel blanket and a heating pad, too.
One thing I would recommend: if you have open electrical outlets in your bedroom, especially by your bed, put your fingers by them to see if they're letting a lot of cold air in. In my apartment there was a discernible draft, and I plugged them with those plastic child safety outlet plugs. I don't know how much of a difference it will make, but I don't want to be losing all my heat through the electrical outlets!
Here the heat is off. Well, except for that one time the roommate turned it all the way up to 70! Right now, at nearly 8 o'clock in the morning, it's 57.
We sleep with a lot of blankets. When the roomies get cold, I've trained them to start our wood stove, which does a grand job of warming the place up.
I have a down blanket that comes out for the cold nights. If it get's super cold I'll add in flannel sheets but i far prefer "regular" sheets. My boys each have a sleeping bag that they sleep in for the winter. It makes making their beds easier too! We have a wood stove, and will run it during the evening to take the chill off, and first thing in the morning to do the same but the rest of the time we're good laying up and keeping our socks on. The house has stayed at about 66 all week, and on the cold nights without the woodstove it will get down to 55 which is a bit too nippy for daily function hence the fires!
The motherboard on our central heat/air went out early this summer and we've been heating the house with 2 oil-filled radiant heaters this winter. So far, our electric bill hasn't gone up since summertime and our gas bill is practically nil! This is really pretty cool since we've already survived 2 blizzards followed by several well below freezing days!
For me, I love a chilly bedroom with lots of warm blankets on the bed. Add to that recipe one husband who is like a radiator, two pitbulls and one miniature schnauzer and you have one very warm bed (and almost no room to move).
Funny/odd thing about warm rooms to sleep in - I always wake up with stuffy sinuses and a head that feels too big for my body!
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A nice warm duvet does the trick. Plus snuggling/body heat is always good to keep warm ;)
The heat vent in our bedroom is closed, I measured the temp in there the other week when it was cold and our BR was 44F!! We have a goose down comforter and flannel sheets. I sleep in PJs and socks but once the bed is warm, I kick my socks off. With 2 people in a double bed it warms up pretty fast.
When we get up in the AM it actually feels warm in the rest of the house when the thermostat is set at 55. I turn the thermostat up to ~68 and by the time we're ready for breakfast it's toasty.
I run the space heater continuously for about 15 minutes before I go to bed- it gets the bedroom, which is the coldest room in the house otherwise, to a comfortable temperature. Then I unplug the heater and get in bed and by the time the room cools down I'm snuggly warm in various flannel sheets, blankets, and quilts.
Sera- I sleep with a hottie, too, but I think that means something different up here. *grin*
One word: DOWN. Everybody has a down comforter - and two of the three were bought at Goodwill, so the expense was quite reasonable. We have propane heat and a leaky old house (expensive!!), so I turn the heat down as low as possible at night, which I think is about 55. Nonetheless, I find I get too hot about 2 am.
And I sleep in the buff! The kids have warm footed pajamas, and my husband like to sleep in long johns. We are updayting the insulation this year.
We are just a bit south of you (in Portland) and nights are getting nippy (about 42-45)...each of the kids is in a fleece sleepsack (bought at REI some time ago) with a down comforter. I sleep under a down comforter, with lots of layers on and a hat. We have extra blankets (thermal, electric, and woolen) for when it is really cold.
I am really loving how much more used to the cold I am getting. One thing I've noticed, though, is that my nose is sometimes cold. It's made me want to try sleeping in a ski mask :)
I have a lovely "hottie" that wraps around my neck, and the kids love it too...it smells yummy! But I have not tried bringing it to bed with me - I usually just wear it if I'm sitting at my computer or other non-moving activities.
Have fired up the woodstove a few times, but haven't had to a lot yet. We pump the space heater a little in the mornings while getting dressed, and use our homemade kotatsu in the evenings.
Thanks for the inspiration!
I have a programmable thermostat so it gets cold at night. My bedroom is on the southside of the house. I open the curtains in the morning and use passive solar heat to warm the room. I close the curtains when I get home from work. Once the snow flies I put more blankets on the bed, switch to flannel sheets and sleep in fleece pjs. Even the dog has a couple of extra fleece blankets on the bed during the winter.
One question. What kind of socks do you have around your house that are too scary for kids? :)
It's not especially cold here yet (our nighttime lows have been in the mid-40s), but I have a blanket. In addition, there's a pit bull that sleeps on my feet and legs and a cat that sleeps on my back, so I've actually found the nights to be a little warmer than I prefer.
In defferance to Miss. Vanessa, sleeping naked is only green in the summer. In the winter sleeping with my flannel loungewear, and a sweat shirt under a king size comforter is the Mode of the day! (Fanciful words- No?)
Heehee : I was pretty sure that the bedwarmer link was going to open up to a photo of a cat or dog!
Hey, menopause will heat up the entire room. All you need is someone like me, and your heating bills will go WAY down!
A hobbit husband who puts off more heat per square inch of body surface than a nuclear reactor chamber. And a cat for my feet.
I lowered the heat to 63 day and night. We have 2 portable heaters. If it gets too chilly at night I turn it on just long enough to knock the chill off and then off again. It doesn't get too cold here so this seems to work for us.
Not too cold yet here in suburban NYC . . . in fact, it's been curiously warm - but my kids are getting prepared! They have all requested "snuggies" for Christmas (those blankets with sleeves that are apparently advertised on some of the horrible Nick shows they watch on TV). My 11 year old son realized that it was warmest in his sisters' room, so he's already set up his mattress on the floor, plugged in his alarm clock - pretty much moved in for the winter. In our 180 year old farmhouse, it's basically cold in the bedrooms upstairs no matter what we set the thermostat for downstairs - so we just set it real, real low and heap on the blankets. We're all used to it by now. I much prefer it to being hot in the summer.
Well as promised, my heat is off. We only have a tiny wall heater and a gas fireplace in the living room. But we do live in San Diego. I have been using the electric blanket mainly because my feet are often cold. The increase in electric bill has been negligible, so it is a good solution.
Still no heat here in Maine! Having no furnace makes that easier... and the woodstove still hasn't been hooked up... and it has been suspiciously mild outside (snow today, though!) A space heater on now and then, the electric blanket before bed, the hot water bottle, we're doing okay. Glad to see so many people joining in with the challenge here!
I keep the house at 65F in the daytime and 60F at night. We're all happy with a cool bedroom and warm jammies. Though today, because my son and I were going out in the morning, I left it on 60F and forgot to turn it back up when we got home.
When I realized it was cold, I just got out my bedwarmer (rice poured into quilted channels of fabric with a pretty cover), tossed it in the microwave, then put it on my ottoman where I prop up my feet when I'm in my writin' chair. Then I put on my Slanket, plopped my laptop on my lap and was happy like I had good sense. My son, a Yankee to the core, didn't seem to notice the cold at all.
I'd say the keys to keeping properly warm when the temps are low in the house are flannel jammies at night, and wool sweaters and Slankets in the daytime.
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