Conquer The Cold In Your Home With These Simple Tips And Ideas

This is a collaborative post

Keeping the cold at bay at home is always a challenging experience, especially during the winter. It’s amazing how many spaces there are in a house that can let in freezing air and bring a draft that makes you feel permanently cold. I’m sitting here now feeling rather chilly and trying not to budge that heating up!

Fortunately, there are numerous ways you can conquer the cold in your home and make it feel more comfortable. Here’s everything you need to know:

Start Moving

Yep, the first piece of advice is to start moving and get going. Instead of sitting down all the time, move around more. You’ll soon notice that your home isn’t quite as cold as you thought it was. People engaging in exercise often feel the same level of comfort in temperatures up to 15°C less than those who are sedentary. Pottering around in the kitchen or doing work in the garden can immediately improve how you feel. If you work from home, make sure you get up every now and then to get that blood pumping round your body.

Put On Some Gloves

I don’t know about you, but often the first parts of my body that feel the cold are my hands, feet and neck. Putting on gloves, socks, and scarves can be an excellent way to conquer the cold in your home. Last year I actually got a pair of fingerless gloves to help me when I’m typing away, because my hands were getting so cold but I didn’t want to boost the heating just because of cold hands! Covering your extremities and providing them with a little warmth will keep you feeling toasty, even in the coldest interiors.

If you want, you can combine movement with putting on extra clothes. Getting a little exercise while wearing gloves can warm you up quicker! Or you can just get one of those big snuggly hooded blankets and pop it over the top of you (I have one and have definitely worn it while I have been sat at my desk!

Cook Something That Will Warm You Up

You can try cooking something that will warm you up if you’re struggling to keep warm. Choose items with a lot of water content that will raise your core temperature, like a hot water bottle from the inside out. The best options for wintertime are soups and stews. These can instantly change how you feel and turn a grim winter’s day into something enjoyable.

My go-to when I’m feeling the chill is a nice warm cup of tea. You could try things like hot cocoa or a cup of coffee in a big mug if tea isn’t your thing. Warm liquids should be your go-to.

Make Your Floors Cosier

You can warm your home by making your floors cosier. While tiles are a great summer option and perfect for those living in tropical climates, they can feel cold and harsh in the winter.

Therefore, consider adding more fabrics to your floors. Rugs are an excellent option if you are on a budget. However, if you have a bigger budget, you could opt for high-tog carpets throughout your home, trapping more warmth from your central heating and reducing the need to walk around in shoes all the time. We have LVT flooring downstairs because of the dogs but I’d have carpet in a heartbeat if I could guarantee that they’d stay clean!

Use The Sun

You can also heat your home in the winter by using the sun. While it might not be as high in the sky, it can still provide a lot of warmth.

For instance, if you get solar panels for your home, you can use sunlight in the winter to power electric heaters. You can also heat your home passively by opening curtains and blinds in the morning when the sun comes up and closing them at night when it goes down at night. Keeping window coverings open in the day lets a small quantity of infrared light in during the day which can heat your home by a couple of degrees, making life easier for your boiler. You can then prevent warmer surfaces in your home from radiating their heat by keeping your curtains closed when it gets dark.

Invest In Space Heaters For Just One Room

You can also try saving money while warming your home by investing in space heaters for individual rooms. These are more efficient than simply putting on the heating and mean the rooms you use the most stay warm for longer. The only issue with this is then going into another room and feeling the chill, but you will have saved a bit of money at least!

Add Insulation

You can also try adding extra insulation around the home to keep the worst of the cold out during the winter. Instead of whacking the heating up to the maximum and hoping for the best, you can retain more of the heat indoors for longer.

Most homeowners underestimate the quantity of insulating materials their home requires. Many people think a few inches in the attic and some newspaper stuffed in the walls will suffice. However, that’s not the truth. The new standard is to lay around 30 cm of thick insulation in the loft, which works around 70% better than the regular stuff installed years ago.

Use Your Fireplace

Finally, if you have a fireplace, be sure to use it. Wood fires can generate substantial heat without contributing to CO2 emissions. Some are even carbon neutral, depending on where you sourced the wood. Just make sure you get your chimneys cleaned out first. We don’t have a real fire but have an electric one that looks like one. It’s amazing how just having it on makes me feel warmer – it doesn’t even need to be letting out heat!

Do you have any great ways to keep extra warm at home?