Quite a serene start to the day, I took the boys in as Gill wasn't feeling up to it and then went on to visit Anna's pile of vegetation... I cut a load of sticks out of it and came home with them, and will do a load of shreddable materials next... possibly taking them to the James St depot for the green waste skip...
Home in time to fill in our feedback form about the 'Strengthening Families' programme, which is being assessed by Warwick University. Then off to the Heworth Family Centre for the final meeting of the parenting course, where we gave feedback to Richard from Icarus, who will do a report about the various families and parenting courses which have been trialled in York over the past year and a bit, and then City of York Council will know which approaches work and which give value for money...
Then at midday we all headed over to Meltons Too on Walmgate for a meal. I went via the Council offices on St Leonards Place to give in the planning application responses from last night, and still got to the restaurant before any of the car-borne people...
Lovely meal, I had leek and potato soup, a little on the salty side, with bread, which was also salty (perhaps it's because we don't add salt to anything?) and then a baked mushrooms with cheese sauce and breadcrumbs dish, and tiramasu... what a treat, very filling and delicious!
We had certificates presented and a card given, it was good to chat away and exchange stories.
Raced home well after 2 to go to the veg shop and get back so I could pick up the kids!
I got soaked on the way to school and came home with three little chaps, two of them eager to go to Martial Arts.... Gill took them there but it had been cancelled, at least no-one else had turned up so they came back and I phoned our friend Maria to say not to pick up her son and ours from there but to come straight here.... and when she came, we had a good chat whilst I peeled pears to dry them... school had thrown away about 15 small pears (no idea why!) so I am making use of them and doing a pile of pear halves.
After tea... not a huge lot as I was still full from lunch... I did a load of emailing and got two messages on this blog in my inbox on 27th and 28th Feb 07 asking me about where Clearview Stoves can be purchased/installed from... So, a message to Alan the Lumberjack and Lindsay, who know Pauline, you should contact 'The Stove Gallery' (also known as Pete the Sweep) which is at:
41-43 High Street,
Starbeck near Harrogate,
tel 01423 887799
e: http://www.thestovegallery.com/
They have quite a few stoves on show, including the wonderful Clearview range, and provide friendly and professional installation, servicing and advice. They recommended getting our chimneys lined with insulated concrete, and we used 'Chimneycrete': http://www.chimneycrete.com/frontpage.htm and are very happy with the performance of both flues.
Despite recommending Clearview Stoves and The Stove Gallery to literally dozens of people, I have never been offered a discount and I could never say that they are cheap.... but I trust their knowledge and ability so continue to use them. And Clearview Stoves are widely recognised as being the best smokefree stoves available: http://www.clearviewstoves.com/index.htm
We have two Clearviews, a Vision 500 flat-top which gives up to 8kw of heat, and a Pioneer 400 flat-top which gives up to 5kw. These give us enough heating and cooking to make our other fuel bills tiny... an annual gas bill of about £50 and our annual electricity bill is about £230, paid to Good Energy Ltd http://www.good-energy.co.uk/ who supply 100% renewable electricity.
Showing posts with label The Stove Gallery. Show all posts
Showing posts with label The Stove Gallery. Show all posts
A reasonable day... A slow start but at 10ish I got up as at 10.30 was expecting a visit from someone from The Stove Gallery/Pete The Sweep to fit a replacement 'Turbobaffle' which is the part of the stove which makes it smokefree. It sits in the top of the firebox and takes air from an inlet beneath the stove and the air is channeled through a long labyrinth within the baffle which heats the air up. The air then enters the firebox through lots of tiny holes, giving jets of fresh hot air, causing much turbulence and complete combustion, high thermal efficiency and 'smokefree' status. But an expensive bit of kit. The old one had somehow become overheated and had become mis-shapen and wasn't functioning at full whack. Will have to treat it with more respect. I will have to tell Gill NOT to leave the bottom-air open as this makes the stove too hot and can damage the turbobaffle. She often forgets to close it down after opening it up to ignite fresh fuel, and I come in to find it open and her getting on with whatever, having forgotten to close the spinner at the bottom....
So I waited for the stove person and got a phone call saying he'd be late. I split logs and cut sticks. Then the chap came, he was really nice and wrestled with the stove for a long time, eventually putting the turbobaffle in, replaced the rope-seal on the door and was interested to read my latest column, published today in Community Care, on 'Healthy Hobbies'.
Lunch and all too soon it was time to go to school. Gill got the boys, I attended the first AGM of the Green Thumb Gang and we agreed a constitution, all over in half an hour. I whizzed along to St Nicks to attend a sustainability surgery and give composting advice. This was followed by the Hull Road Ward Committee Meeting which was very quick.
Home for tea.
So I waited for the stove person and got a phone call saying he'd be late. I split logs and cut sticks. Then the chap came, he was really nice and wrestled with the stove for a long time, eventually putting the turbobaffle in, replaced the rope-seal on the door and was interested to read my latest column, published today in Community Care, on 'Healthy Hobbies'.
Lunch and all too soon it was time to go to school. Gill got the boys, I attended the first AGM of the Green Thumb Gang and we agreed a constitution, all over in half an hour. I whizzed along to St Nicks to attend a sustainability surgery and give composting advice. This was followed by the Hull Road Ward Committee Meeting which was very quick.
Home for tea.
Up at a civilised time and got dressed pretty sharpish as we had booked Pete The Sweep who's based near Harrogate. We use them as they fitted our Clearview stoves and they do replacement parts... which it turned out we needed. The back firebrick had almost completely worn through in our biggest stove, the one we use every day. When it was taken out it fell apart. The 'turbobaffle' is also shot after more than 10 years almost continuous use and will also need replacing, but the shop doesn't have them in stock so that will be installed within a couple of weeks. And when they swept the chimneys, one of the wire 'anti-bird' cowl thingies came off so they offered to replace them with ones which are tied firmly on and can cope with a sweep's brush coming up.
The good news is that there was hardly any soot in the chimneys, as the stoves do burn really cleanly, and this small volume of deposit is evidence of that. So they went back to Starbeck to get replacement firebricks as they don't have them in the van, so it has turned out to be an expensive morning, both financially and in terms of van-miles, but as there's a cold-weather warning for the coming weekend, we really have to be able to use the back room stove, and it's not usable without the firebricks.... so they used their lunchhour to go and get what was needed.
So they returned and finished servicing our heating system, and will bill us through the post. An expensive day... but not expensive compared to the cost of most peoples' fuel bills. I still keep on thinking of our winter gas bill of £12!!! And this because we don't use any central heating and cook mainly on the woodstove.
A quiet afternoon, boys occupied and happy enough, I did some work outside and also made a nutloaf.
At 5.30 I went into town to attend the monthly Critical Mass Cycle Celebration, which was good, several new faces and friendly chats. Not a lot of aggro from other road users this time which was good.
Had nutloaf when I came in, and when the kids were in bed, had a game of Scrabble with Gilly and beat her soundly... a difficult board and she did get lousy letters. I got most of the high scorers and it showed in the final tally. A good evening.
The good news is that there was hardly any soot in the chimneys, as the stoves do burn really cleanly, and this small volume of deposit is evidence of that. So they went back to Starbeck to get replacement firebricks as they don't have them in the van, so it has turned out to be an expensive morning, both financially and in terms of van-miles, but as there's a cold-weather warning for the coming weekend, we really have to be able to use the back room stove, and it's not usable without the firebricks.... so they used their lunchhour to go and get what was needed.
So they returned and finished servicing our heating system, and will bill us through the post. An expensive day... but not expensive compared to the cost of most peoples' fuel bills. I still keep on thinking of our winter gas bill of £12!!! And this because we don't use any central heating and cook mainly on the woodstove.
A quiet afternoon, boys occupied and happy enough, I did some work outside and also made a nutloaf.
At 5.30 I went into town to attend the monthly Critical Mass Cycle Celebration, which was good, several new faces and friendly chats. Not a lot of aggro from other road users this time which was good.
Had nutloaf when I came in, and when the kids were in bed, had a game of Scrabble with Gilly and beat her soundly... a difficult board and she did get lousy letters. I got most of the high scorers and it showed in the final tally. A good evening.
