Get cold over winter? Me too! As soon as it comes to about halfway through April I start to feel a sense of impending dread – because I start feeling the cold and wondering how on earth I am going to get through the coming months until the sun comes back out again. How do roller shutters fit into this? Well if you read on ahead, then I may just tell you.
There are only so many layers you can put on and even though I’d really like to, it’s not acceptable practice to wear ugg boots 24/7. So what I’ve done over the years is take a proactive approach to keeping warm – otherwise, there’s no way that I’m going to be able to get through the winter without feeling horrible every day.
So, my first port of call when keeping warm was investing in a good heater. Little ones like the small fan ones, and even subpar gas heaters simply just won’t cut it. When shopping for heaters you need to look for energy efficient heaters, too, otherwise you’ll be spending thousands on your heating bills every winter – it’s just not going to economically viable. This is especially important to remember if you’re choosing electric heaters, what with the recent electricity price hikes, which I think are over the top and are a source of my frowning too.
Next up was making sure my home was properly insulated. Most of the time a cold house is due to not being effective at keeping the heat in. Many older homes in particular, are not insulated correctly, and this a reason why your home may be colder than other people’s. So, for me, this involved replacing the old insulation in the roof. You can lose a lot of heat through the roof, especially since hot air rises, so adequate roof insulation is essential for keeping a home warm.
Now, just as you can lose heat overhead, so too you can lose it underfoot also, through the floor in some buildings. It may not seem like a brilliant option ripping up all your flooring to put down insulation, however, this is an option. Another option is carpeting your floors or putting down rugs. I choose option B, as I like the look of my floorboards and want to show them off over summer when I can whisk away the rugs if need be.
Next up is making sure that the heat isn’t escaping through one of the most usual ways that this can happen – through your windows. Now there are a lot of different ways that you can choose to insulate your windows. This includes replacing your windows with double glazed or triple glazed windows, adding thick curtains to all windows, or what I chose to do, add roller shutters to the outside of my windows.
The point of doing any of these window insulation techniques is to add another layer to the window which helps to keep heat out. To me, when looking into my options, I realised that adding roller shutters to my home was the smartest choice. Not only would they help with keeping warm over winter, but they could keep the heat out over summer, and also provide security for when I went out. There had been a string of break-ins around my area recently, and I was also trying to think about ways to secure my home more, so it was a little bit of a no brainer in that regard.
So, all of this process will take a little investment, however, it is worth it when you think about how much time you spend at home and how miserable you can feel when you feel cold. If you aren’t ready to do all of it at once, then you can do it one at a time, over a longer period.
Roller shutters aren’t often what you think of when you think about heating your home, but to me, they were well worth the outlay, and they are useful for other purposes, too.
The setup that I have now is great and I definitely feel much warmer over winter in my own home than I used to. Now I don’t have to be continually sipping hot tea with a million layers on when I’m at home. It makes thing a lot easier in that respect, plus I can be happy to have guests around without feeling like they have been invited to hang out in an icicle.
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