*Winter Survival Questions**

Golly, you hit a spot for sure, this thread grew fast!!!

I think we should start a collection and bring Daisy and Delilah's mom up here for a week right now so she can experience all the fun first hand!!

The serious reason for keeping the gas tank full has been mentioned, to avoid condensation. But another reason is that, if the cover to your gas cap freezes, then you can't ADD any gas until it thaws! And yes, the doors may freeze shut, especially on the side getting hit with the wind. Many times I've only been able to open the passenger side and had to climb over to the driver's seat. Not too easy with bucket seats and the shift on the floor there!

There is stuff you can add to your gas line to help prevent freezing and condensation. And of course antifreeze in the radiator is a must. You better make sure you are using the right window washer or your wipers will freeze to your windshield and you will have a sheet of ice on there. For years Dad took his car in every Spring and every Autumn. Autumn was to winterize the car, have all the warm weather stuff drained out and the cold weather stuff put in. We use a different oil in the car in the cold weather, than in the summer, too. Then in Spring, all that had to be drained and the warm weather version put in.

I used to enjoy winter, when I was younger. I was into sledding, toboganning, and skiing. Now I can't do any of that stuff and I do not enjoy winter as much. I do find I plan my trips, based on the weather. Today for example I did NOT go out, and Sugar did NOT get her 30 minute walk. She was just in the backyard a bunch of times to stretch her legs.

When I worked in a professional office setting, it was common for women to keep "work shoes" in their desk drawer. You come in to work and shed all the outer garb, the boots and multi pairs of socks, and put on your "professional" look. Many women spent time in the ladies room adjusting their hair, and I mean TIME, with blow dryers and curling irons and all. Makeup is GREAT to protect your skin in the cold, so women always came in with that already on. Some of us even wore our glasses to commute and switched to contact lenses after we arrived. Since the cold wind can make your eyes water, that is not a good way to keep your contacts in. Many of the men where I was working came in and shaved after they arrived. Didn't like the cold on the just shaven skin.

I grew up in Massachusetts; in my 30's I lived in Maine for 5 years. I thought I knew what winter was. HA! Their snow plows for clearing the roads are humongous! My last winter there, we had a total of 127 inches of snow. That was it, I said "I'm outta here before another flake hits the ground!"

If you grew up in cold weather climes, you grew up seeming to "KNOW" all these things, it is interesting reading this thread and realizing how much we do "naturally."

Sounds like a great idea!!! lol lol lol Please collect enough money for all the winter clothing I'll need to make this trip and not freeze to death within minutes. Can I bring some other Floridians with me?? Any takers?

Terry makes a shopping list.......3 wool parkas, 5 bulky sweaters, 3 pairs of those pants Glacier mentioned, 2 pairs of snow boots...........where do I buy all this stuff? I don't think they sell it here in Florida :D As a matter of fact, I don't think they sell anything wool here. A wool blanket is a collectors item :eek: Oh yea, I can't forget wardrobes for the girls too :confused:

LOL Well I'm not necessarily a brave soul... after all it's a nice comfy 72 degrees in my office :D. I let it get down to about 63-65ish at night but I have a nice warm comforter and three snuggly dogs ;). Having the right "gear" is the secret to survival though that's for sure! The plow trucks here are gigantic too compared to the little ones where I grew up. But they haven't had to plow much this year! :eek: :(

Living in MI, I'm not confined to the house when the temps get cold. Like MN and OH, it got down to the -20's with the windchill Sunday and Monday. I still leave the house to go to work or run errands.

Kia loves to be out in it, but I'm finding the Chipper doesn't like to be out for longer than 15 minutes. He starts to cry and hop from foot to foot, so we've been keeping trips outside short.

I love snow and playing in it, but don't care for the single digits and the negative windchill numbers.

Like everyone else, I just let the car run longer before driving off to give the engine time to properly warm up. :) I've never had to plug any of my cars in though.

When I woke up this morning our thermometer said -6°F, wind chill was -20°F! :eek: Many of the area schools delayed for 2 hours, although I though that was pointless as the HIGH temp today was still in the single digits!

I had to warm up the car for 20 minutes and it still wasn't really warm inside, and still had snow on the floorboard leftover from a short errand I took yesterday!!

I don't like cold, but what makes it worse is that until recently we'd been having ABOVE avg. temps so we didn't get a normal gradual introduction to winter weather like we should. We sorta skipped right from late summer to winter!

I stay inside alot and bundle up really good before I go out.

BTW, NEVER pour hot water over a frozen car door to unstick it unless you can open it FAST! I did that once with my first car and couldn't get it open before it froze even worse! Bad thing was my mom's car was in FRONT of mine in the single driveway, so neither of us could get out for school or work that morning even though we could get the passenger door open on hers.

Ahhh, the joys of learning your winter lessons! LOL

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Originally Posted by Daisy and Delilah

Terry makes a shopping list.......3 wool parkas, 5 bulky sweaters, 3 pairs of those pants Glacier mentioned, 2 pairs of snow boots...........where do I buy all this stuff? I don't think they sell it here in Florida :D As a matter of fact, I don't think they sell anything wool here. A wool blanket is a collectors item :eek: Oh yea, I can't forget wardrobes for the girls too :confused:

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Don't forget socks, the more the better! I layer them too! :D

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Originally Posted by Freedom

I think we should start a collection and bring Daisy and Delilah's mom up here for a week right now so she can experience all the fun first hand!!

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I second that motion! Somehow I think her girls would appreciate their Florida home a lot more after having to go potty outside in below zero wind chills like we have had. Just this morning I was watching Bella and Ripley and was so glad that I don't have to go outside to go to the bathroom! :o :D

This was the reading on my thermometer this morning on my way into work:
ZERO!! :eek:
All of the schools in North East Ohio are closed again today!

Thought of another thing we do here in the cold. We have winter curtains and summer curtains. I grew up with this. The winter curtains are heavy drapes. My mom even made one pair of fiber glass lined drapes for the living room. Summer curtains are sheers, lacy, and stay at the sides of the windows. Winter curtains get drawn across to help keep the heat in. I remember spending a week or more visiting aunts, neighbors and friends helping with the change over.

I don't know if many folks do this now. The new vinyl replacement windows help a LOT in keeping the heat inside. And as compared to my mum's generation, more women work outside the home now. I don't even HAVE curtains! :eek: Just valances, same ones year round. I say it's because the cats would just climb and shred curtains. (well, they WOULD!)

These cold days, we only put the shades up in the kitchen and livingroom. the bedrooms and bath, the shades stay drawn all day as well as all night.

I came up with a better idea. Since I'm starting to feel bad for all of you and feeling really guilty myself for almost living the "Life of Riley"(in comparison)........why don't all of you come on down to Florida and get thawed out? :)

Winter and summer curtains? I've heard it all now. Who knew???

Stay warm everyone!!! :D It's chilly here this morning but certainly nowhere near the dreaded "zero"(or worse :eek: ).

It's -33C right now, and "feels like" -43C. :(

I love the idea of summer/winter curtains. We replaced all the windows in our house a few years ago but with settling some of them already don't close tight. They wouldn't be expensive to buy/put together and every little bit helps when it comes to saving energy.

Our house also has a zoning system where we can keep different rooms at different temps. For example, our bedroom is kept at 64 degrees while Mimi's room never falls below 68, our basement rarely gets heat or AC because we spend so little time down there. This alone has saved us a boatload over the past 3 years.

It is, once again, 55 here. Cold, I'll tell you. It was too cold to go outside this morning..LOL.

Ahh... but the best part about the sub-zero temperatures? Staying inside beside the fire wrapped up in a big fluffy puffy comforter, with a hot chocolate and baileys and a pile of dogs, watching the fluffy snow fall and cover the trees.

(until you have to get up in the morning and shovel all the no-longer-fluffy-now-super-dense snow off the drive to get to work) ;)

A tropical heat wave...

The temperature is up - to - 7 F! Woohoo, we broke zero! Tomorrow's forecast high is 18 F. The only good thing about an unexpected snowstorm is that snow on the car conceals how grossly dirty the car is because it's been too nasty cold to go to the car wash. Hurry up, spring!