We've been saving our pennies for some time now. We wished to ensure that we could be warm all winter - no matter what. And today, we made it happen! We had installed a high efficiency wood stove. Now, winters are very, very cold here in Manitoba. We are outside of the city of Brandon and during storms, power can be a little unreliable here. We could, literally, freeze to death in some freaky, wild blizzard, worst-case-scenario. Did I mention that it can get really, really, really cold here?
There was a wood stove in the house when we took it over. It could not, however, be insured because it wasn't up to current code. It was big, had no windows, was leaking and wasn't very efficient. We may still have to increase the hearth around the new one a bit, but we will be able to insure it. And is this little stove ever beautiful: full glass door so you can see your fire, cook top so that we won't starve to death in our freaky scenario, awesome little ash drawer! It stands up on a pedestal so the fire is at eye-level when we're seated. We can supply a fair amount of our own firewood from our shelter belt: natural dead fall and some pruning of the willow and maple, mostly. We can purchase some oak and other woods quite readily. Of course, we could get into a whole, interesting discussion about burning wood and the environment, but our alternative here is existing electric base boards. Expensive to run and absolutely no good for anything during a power failure! What our little stove means to us: a little wintertime peace of mind!
