In the past we've lived in places which were horribly, horribly inefficient. The dry cabin with thin walls and minimal insulation. Our last apartment in Fairbanks, where we could feel cold air from under the front door. (I made a long rice bag to put by the door to stop the draft, but it shouldn't have been necessary if our landlord had been even halfway smart.) It has been frustrating to know that we couldn't do much about the inefficiencies.
Now, though. Now we can! Such a good feeling.
It has started small. HusbandX set up a cord for me (which can easily be taken down) to line-dry our clothes. I've been doing this for years because it not only saves on electricity costs (massively) but it's also really hard on clothes to put them through a dryer. I don't particularly like shopping, and the clothes I do have I tend to like. Go figure. So, I want to keep them nice for as long as possible. Line drying our clothes is one of the easiest ways to do that. All summer I hung out our clothes (and sheets, and blankets) to dry, which they did remarkably fast. Even through the fall I was still drying our clothes out there, taking advantage of the sunny days to do so.
This doesn't mean that we eschew the dryer entirely, unfortunately. Towels still go in the dryer and the Munchkin's diapers have gone in the dryer. This will change, since we got new diapers for Baby #2 and they line dry amazingly well. Even with the diapers and towels, however, we've been averaging one load in the dryer a week. If I'm washing diapers, I hunt around for any towels that also need to get washed. two loads in the washing machine (one of which is very small) can easily be combined in the dryer.
The one thing I never line-dry outside: our underwear. For everyone's sake. I just hang that up in our rooms on hangers in the closets, or the Munchkin's on the knobs of her dresser so they're easy for her to put away when dry.
We're still trying to come up with a good way to line dry everything inside during the wet winters, something that doesn't take up too much space because, really, who wants to dedicate tons of space to that? I only wash about one load of clothes each week anyway. (Seriously.) We have a few ideas for the laundry room but, since it hasn't been a problem so far, those plans have been held off for a little while as we focus on other things. For now, I'm using a clothes rack and a mostly empty closet down in the office to hang dry our clothes indoors. Sheets can get dried, and rather quickly, over the shower curtain bar in the bathroom.
Next on my list, the city of Seattle has a program for residents to buy compost and yard waste bins. Instead of shipping out our compost, we could do it right here at home! These are a bit cheaper than they would be if purchased elsewhere, and they have instructions for how to make them rat-proof. I ordered two compost bins and a yard waste bin. Then, I reduced the size of the yard waste bin that the city empties and hauls away. (Savings: $6/month.) I was originally going to see if I could get rid of the yard waste barrel entirely until I realized that I still need it for the invasive plants I yank (bindweed and blackberries) and that animal food scraps such as bones can be composted by the city, which they can't/shouldn't be at home.
This decision is only saving us a minimal amount of money per month, but since I garden there will be benefits to it far down the road. I won't have to buy compost for my garden beds, saving me both time and money as well as effort. Having the compost right there means that I don't have to drag bags of it, or carry shovels of it, all around. Having compost in my garden beds also means both less frequent watering and greater nutrition in my produce. Wins all around!
Along with the yard waste barrel, however, I reduced the size of our garbage can. I've been on a mission to reduce all of our waste (both garbage and recycling) for several years. I can't claim to be anywhere near zero waste (bummer) but it has been remarkably easy to make a few small changes that have led to giant reductions in waste. We only generate one small bag of garbage a week so I figured that even when our friend moves into the downstairs apartment and my brother moves into the spare bedroom we still won't be producing all that much garbage. When we moved in here we had a large 64-gallon garbage cart, which alone cost $72.90. Ouch. When I changed the size of the yard waste barrel I also moved us down to the 20 gallon "mini can", which will fit about three garbage bags a week. Our total cost for waste removal is now $33.15 a month, less than half of what garbage alone was costing when we moved in.
Waste rates are also going up around here on April 1st of this year. The more garbage can you need or want, the more your rate will go up. This makes my reduction in garbage bin size even more worthwhile.
I didn't do anything about our recycling can because recycling is free. My only other option was to add a second cart, and we really don't need that.
We started replacing bulbs with LEDs. Any lights that have gone out, and we've actually had a few do so since we moved in, and a few others have been replaced with LEDs because they just weren't good lights. Lights that get the most use have also been replaced with LEDs, and the Christmas lights we bought are all LEDs. With the price having fallen so much (and the automatic rebates Seattle residents get) there is absolutely no reason not to do this.
We also gave the Munchkin a nightlight in her room. One of the outlets has a cover on it which detects when it's dark and an LED turns on automatically. It's dim, but just enough light to take away some of that fear of the dark. She loves it, and we love that we don't have to remember to turn it on and off. Nor can she play with it, which if you know our kid you know she would totally do, so it's not in any way a toy. We're trying to figure out a good place in the hallway to put another light for those midnight bathroom trips or scary dreams that send her racing for our room.
There's a program around here called Trees for Seattle. They give out free trees! The goal in doing this is multifacted: to reduce the heat island effect in Seattle by improving the canopy, to clean the air, to clean the water runoff, and to reduce traffic speeds and noise. I'm sure there are others that I'm forgetting. Mature trees also bump up property prices and, in our case, produce fruit. Yep, we got a free self-pollinating cherry tree. Squee! I'm so excited. Cherries are my favorite fruit (well, they vie for that position with peaches) so having our own source of cherries is pretty much a dream come true. The fact that we didn't even have to pay for this tree rather blows my mind.
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| My cherry tree! |
There is a lifetime limit of six trees per household, so choose wisely. I only asked for the one tree this year because I'm still trying to figure out what I want to do in terms of landscaping. We can make our property even more efficient (in terms of light, heat, water usage, food production, etc.) by implementing good landscaping and trees are a major part of that. This first year, though, to reduce overwhelm I've decided to push most of that off. Besides which, I'd like to know how our house does in all seasons before I make major changes. It would be pretty sad to put a light-loving plant in what turns out to be a shady area most of the year, or a plant that needs dryer conditions in a swampy area of the yard.
I'm embarrassed to admit how long this one has taken us. When we moved into this house it had a leaky faucet in one of the bathrooms. My original plan was just to fix the leak. I even went so far as to buy a kit to fix it, but then we talked more and realized that we hated the faucet anyway. It was cheap, and looked it, and it was old so it was getting gunked up and hard for the Munchkin to use. We decided to just go ahead and replace that faucet, as well as the one in our bathroom. That one doesn't leak, but it does squeak every time we turned the knobs. It's loud enough to wake us up sometimes.
However, making that decision never lead to action. We briefly looked at faucets, priced some out, never came to an agreement about what, exactly, we wanted, and let the whole problem stagnate. So the leak continued, for months. Finally, I got fed up. I went in there with the replacement parts and got all set to do it. Then I realized that not only did I not have the wrench I needed, my brother having taken it, but there was a big lead warning on the side of the replacement parts. Since I'm currently gestating a tiny human, I figured that calling in help was required. I called my brother, who brought over the wrench and the know-how and the strength, and I basically sat back to watch him work. But hey, now I know how to do it!
We also discovered in the course of this work that the hot water does not completely turn off to that sink, so we added one more project to the giant list of to-dos. We also discovered that the bathtub upstairs leaks into the bathroom downstairs. An easy fix with plumber's putty, but yet another issue to work on. I suspect that plumbing will be a frequent issue with our older house going forward.
Thankfully, the previous owners installed a low-flow showerhead in the main bathroom and a dual-flush toilet in the master bathroom. I'm certain we'll find other ways that we can and should reduce our water usage, but having some of them done for us is quite nice.
We got an energy audit. Again, this is free through our utility. Most of what they told us was stuff we already knew: increase or replace the insulation in the attic, check out the elderly fridge to see how much electricity it's using each month. Things like that. However, we found out that there's no insulation in the exterior walls. Fixing that will not only increase the efficiency of our house, it will also make things quieter. I've added that to our incredibly long list of projects we'd like to do.
It was wonderful to have an expert come and assess what was really worthwhile to button up our home for all seasons and weather. He flagged the big-ticket items that would be the most worthwhile and, in many ways, it was nice to see how few there were. Of them, most items were flagged for potential problems down the road. Our furnace is a bit older and he recommended getting it serviced, as well as looking into replacing it sometime in the next five or so years. This will give us time to save up money for the replacement even as we budget for the other upgrades and changes we need to do. The insulation is the biggest priority, naturally, but we also have to balance the resources of time and money so I don't yet know when we'll get around to that. My hope is that at least one of the insulation projects can be done this year. Our utility not only has a list of reliable contractors, but also gives rebates of up to half the cost. Yay!
In the midst of all these things, we've been dealing with lots of other projects too. We finished painting upstairs, for one. (Huge thanks here to a friend who helped us the whole way through.) HusbandX and a friend replaced the garbage disposal, for another. It hadn't worked since we moved in and, at the end of summer, we got a massive fruit fly infestation that we realized was coming from the drain, where food particles had gotten stuck. Ew. They searched online for parts but the old disposal was so old that no one sold any of the needed parts anymore, so replacement it was.
HusbandX cleared the most-likely-asbestos-filled popcorn off the ceiling downstairs. It was easier work than he'd expected, at least the actual scraping, but still a major hassle. He wore safety gear and had to thoroughly clean everything down there all by himself. Nasty work. Then he had to texture and paint the ceiling (again, our friend came to help with the painting) so it was quite the project.
HusbandX, his dad, and his brother built us a kitchen island. It massively increased the amount of usable counter space and storage we have in our kitchen, and is far cheaper than remodeling. Since we don't have any sort of a pantry, this extra storage space is allowing us to get many things off the counter which otherwise didn't have a home. It also has a cabinet dedicated to all of our kitchen towels and rags, complete with a laundry basket for the used and dirty ones, which is so handy.
We discovered one night that a sink downstairs was clogged and almost overflowing. It was quite obviously connected to our kitchen sink, because there were food particles from what we'd put through the garbage disposal floating around. We tried plunging it and using drain-clearing chemicals but neither worked so, for the first time ever, HusbandX got to snake a drain. Drain snakes can be rented and are far cheaper than hiring a plumber, which would have been our last resort if the snake hadn't worked. Thankfully it did, because I was dreading having to find a reliable plumber. This was also the same night our child decided, while we were busy trying to figure out the sink issue, to put an entire roll of toilet paper and a book into her bath. It was quite the night.
This has all happened, of course, around jobs and family obligations and illness and holidays and whatnot. And, it's been happening while I'm increasingly ungainly, unable to help, and tired. The bulk of the credit goes to my spouse, then to our families (particularly my middle brother) and friends for helping out. I get, at best, mild credit for figuring out what rebates are available to us and doing the very lightest of work. I mean, I can still change a lightbulb.
And we still have a long way to go, in terms of making our house actually efficient. There are smart power strips that we can get through our utility for $10 each, rather than the retail cost of between $70-$80. Those should save a fair amount on electricity costs, since they can be used on entertainment centers and, I think, on computers. They monitor the devices to see if they're actually in use and turn them off if not.
We'd also like to get either a programmable or smart thermostat. This will cut down on some of the arguing over what temperature to set the house at. Despite the reputation women have for always being cold, I often find that it's women who want the house's temperature lower. HusbandX wants to be comfortable wearing shorts inside the house year-round and I want to be able to wear my sweaters. He also hates getting out of bed when it's cold and I don't mind so much. A programmable thermostat would mean that we wouldn't have to keep turning it up or down depending on who's home and what time of day. Several brands of smart thermostat are reduced in price through our utility, so those are worth looking into. We just haven't taken the plunge to actually buy one yet.
Another efficient use of our land is for food production. My spouse has completely nixed the idea of backyard chickens (boo!!) but plants are a go. We just don't know yet where we want to put them. We already have some strawberry plants, but we need to order and plant some raspberries and blueberries. The raspberries have a particular space earmarked for them, one that's decently well contained so we wouldn't have to worry about them spreading and taking over, but it will require removing some other shrubs (that we don't like anyway). Hopefully by the time planting season comes around I will be sufficiently recovered from childbirth that I can do a fair bit of the work.
There are further things that we want to implement but won't get to any time soon. Rain barrels, but we need a new roof first. (Sometime in the next five years.) We want to put solar on our house, and will probably start small by just putting a few solar panels on our shed, which faces south and gets good light all day long, even in winter. The house will have to wait because, even if it will save us money in the long run, the initial outlay of funds is not something we're prepared to do right now. Instead, we're focusing first on what we can do to reduce our consumption of heat, electricity, and other resources. That will not only help make eventual solar more worthwhile (selling extra to the utility company is even better the more extra you have) but will also help bring forward the day when we can afford to go solar. That is truly efficient.
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