New Wood Stove!!

Yes that's right!!!  We have a brand new Jotul F3CB Wood Burning Stove in our house!!  I'm so FREAKING excited I can hardly contain myself!!!

Our house, built in 1983, only has gas heated, electric forced air furnace.  It is not very efficient...and I have 2 dogs in our house.  Can you just imagine the dog hair that blows when the furnace is going?  Gross huh?  Sorry.

Not only is it not my favorite b/c it blows hair, and dust, and dries out our house (which doesn't need any help when it's -25 outside), but it's also freakishly expensive!!  For the last 3-4 years we've put plastic up in our windows during the winter, we re-seal our doors, I've put the little foam covers inside my outlets, I put blankets at the bottom of doors to keep any possible draft out, and still our house seems cold and we pay out the nose for it to not feel warm.  It doesn't help we have almost zero carpet in our house.  It's all either slate or laminate, even in the bedrooms.  I love this and I hate this.  Did I mention we have 2 dogs?  I love that we have to carpet...it doesn't smell like dog in our house (at least I hope it doesn't!).  But it's cold.

Anyway...after living here for over 6 years we finally realized we could put a fireplace in the corner if we sold the piano to make room.  I was VERY sad to sell the piano, but it is so worth it to have a wood burning stove.  I also love that we will have a secondary source of heat.  The electricity goes out for a significant amount of time at least once a year and in the past we bundle up to keep warm.  Now I can just keep my fire going!!

I wanted to get it installed before Christmas, but it didn't happen until the 2nd week of January.  It's all good though.  We had a professional installer come in and install it (b/c Shayne is not an installer of chimnies or wood stoves), and it only took about 6 hours and that's with a lunch break.  I was impressed.

Anyway...we had to pay for split wood, but hope to get our own next summer.

It's  not a very big stove, I think it may be almost the smallest one they make, but I'm happy to report I got the stove going and had it up to 77-78 degrees in our house and it actually felt warm in our home!!!  Our upstairs is so hot I have to close our bedroom door just to cool it down enough to sleep at night, and usually our upstairs is the coldest part of the house.  I can dress my kids in t-shirts and let them run around without socks...they won't know what to do with themselves.  :)  And...Obviously our furnace doesn't come on all day too...so saving some money!

I'm in love.

This is seriously the most exciting thing to happen to me in quite awhile!!