The weather is getting chilly outside and the wind is picking up. It’s time to batten down the hatches and get your home ready for the colder weather – and that takes some time! You know that the winter is coming, and in a totally Game of Thrones-esque way, too. Blizzards and hailstones, freezing winds and rain, they’re all coming, and they stick around for a few months. It’s very easy to be snugly through the winter if you know that you have the heating and the fires ready to go – but how can you get these ready?
Winter is a cold time of year, so you need to prep the house and the garden to withstand the onslaught of cold air and rain. In places where blizzards are common, winterizing your home and garden are an absolute must if you don’t want to have a ruined flowerbed or a flood in the basement. So, with this in mind, let’s check out how you can winterize your home ready for the season.
Get The Furnace Serviced
Your furnace is going to need to turn on when you want it to heat the house, but if there is a fault you’re going to need to get that serviced before it’s time to heat the house. You want to save money on your gas bill but you can’t do that if you have a leak. Get it cleaned out by a professional and ensure that it’s topped up with gas ready to go for the winter. You should also ensure that the filter is completely cleaned and ready to run properly! Most emergencies in the winter come from a furnace that hasn’t been prepared.
Keep The Cold Air Out
What’s worse than having the heating on is having heat pumping through the house and having it leak through the cracks in the doors and windows. There are things that you can do, though, to ensure that you don’t lose your hot air that you’re paying for! You can be more energy efficient when you seal the house, so caulk the windows and make sure you’ve invested in weather-stripping. You want to keep doors and windows closed, too, so prevent any unwanted breezes coming through.
Get Handy
There are plenty of handy chores you can do in the house to ensure that the winter weather doesn’t affect your house. You need to have the caulking done, the plant pots outside moved under cover, the pipes wrapped in extra insulation to prevent bursting and even securing any railings and fencing. High winds can take these and blow them about the garden, which is something that you want to avoid so you don’t see something coming through the window. You can also work on resealing the Archadeck so that you can protect your investment. These handy jobs are all the odds and ends you need to do before the season hits.
Clear Leaves
When the leaves fall, they gather around your flower beds and can strangle your flowers. Not only that, but they get wet and sit on the grass, which stops the sunshine coming through and helping the grass to stay healthy. You can get out there with a large rake and keep gathering the leaves a few times a week, and this will help you with building a compost pile. You could also mow them down into the grass. This will avoid thick carpets of leaves as well as offering some feed to the grass, too. While we’re in the garden, drain out all of your hoses so that the water inside won’t freeze and split them. Coil them into the garden shed so that you don’t have them damaged through the winter.
Clean The Gutters
You know how we mentioned that the leaves falling and being gathered? Well, they have a tendency to gather in the gutters, this is going to have an impact on your drainage systems. You can buy gutter guards, but these won’t do the job entirely. Instead, you need to call a professional to come in and clean your drains and gutters for you. You should be doing this twice a year anyway, and you can avoid debris build-up with it.
Winterizing your home is going to help you to stay warm, stay safe and avoid burst pipes and flooded basements. You have to be vigilant about the weather in your area, and the more you look after your home, the less damage there will be when you come out the other side of winter.
