First fire of the season
We had our first wood fire this evening, it’s not really cold, not as cold as it will get, but it was one of those chilly, grey, damp, rainy days that just begged for a nice wood fire. Of course there is the fantasy of sitting in front of a nice toasty wood fire and the reality of having to clean off a summer’s worth of junk, dust and dog hair from the wood stove, none of which smell very good when they get hot :)
Once I had it all cleared off, I almost didn’t want the fire anymore, but it didn’t take much cajoling to get PB to go outside and grab a few pieces of damp wood, almost too damp to burn. A handful of paper trash later and we had a nice toasty small fire going, it was nice to hear the crackle of the flames and smell of the burning wood.
The wood stove is now nicely warm as I sit in my winter configuration, having my laptop inside the SkyCastle, at the table, just behind the wood stove. I’m looking forward to not fighting the bugs that are attracted to the light of my laptop, not worrying about what may climb up my leg outside.
PB has been working on updating the kitchen. Earlier this summer, one of our neighbors gave us an interesting stove/oven that came out of an RV. It’s the same size as the blue one I’ve used from the beginning, but instead of a turquoise blue, it’s a dark cherry red, I tried to find another one like it online, but couldn’t find another in the same color, rare. We have spent the summer wondering which one to keep inside and which one to leave outside for the outdoor kitchen area. PB decided on a third option, keeping them both inside.
I wasn’t sure I liked that idea, that meant having to lose some of my precious storage, and honestly I don’t see myself cooking on BOTH at the same time. I wanted the red one inside. But once PB got everything mocked up, the two stoves side by side look pretty sharp. I also like the arrangement of the burners on top, the blue one has 2 burners in front and 1 in back, the red one has 1 in front and 2 in back, they look like they were made for each other.
The red one has a thermostat for the oven, something the blue one doesn’t have, though I have been able to cook and bake in it just fine, having a thermostat will come in handy. I did lose some of my storage, but I think I’ll be able to live with it, things have been condensed in another area and will probably end up working better. PB is planning on building a vent-a-hood over the …