Story Tellers Diaries

So this last couple of days I have been taking advantage of the sunny days. I have mowed the gardens (takes a couple of sessions as I need to charge the battery in between gardens). I also took the time to repaint the shed as I missed doing it in August when I usually do this job. That took between 2 and 3 hours just to do that. And on top of that working at a delivery job for 5 hours a day...

So now I have done all the jobs I can, I will get to do some story telling again. I have already took some pics ready for the next stage of Willows story.

I also need to do something with the new Rey too to flesh her out a little more. Glowing eyes and stuff, What's going on with her?

Just an update, working on some videos someone has asked for, really time consuming so I won't be able to take any pics etc for Willows new story for the next couple of days...

So will get this latest job finished tomorrow so will have all next week to continue with some doll pics. I'm missing working with them.

If you wondering why there are so many guests, its because i am advertising the site again.

If you have ideas for ads, let me have them. I need ad text and keywords.

Here is a rough summery of my energy costs so far this year.

A little about energy use for a house with solar, battery and heat pump.

I have a 8gb home battery and 5gb solar array as well as a heat pump. But I'm not a tree hugger, I just like the latest gadgets and want to try and keep the energy bills down (by buying 10 years of heating all at once :ROFLMAO:)!

Anyway, my boiler was shot, it was expensive to run and was leaking badly. I had my monies worth out of it over the years so not complaining. So instead of replacing for another gas boiler, I made the decision to get the heat pump.

I no longer have gas in the house and don't pay gas daily charge.

The solar and battery cost £10K. I have a 5 year interest free loan to pay for it. The heat Pump cost £2K to upgrade the under floor piping and upgrade 3 rads to doubles. The actually heat pump and installation cost £3.5K. So all in all I spent about £15.5K to turn my house into the best it can be. I also fitted attic out with more insulation that probably cost about £100 or so, I laid it myself.

Today the temp dropped to 2c and my battery pretty much covers the whole day except for the last 4 hours during the night, which uses electric from the grid. Not sure how much that will cost as if the heating needs to come on to keep the temperature at 17c it can use up to 2.5kWh at 26p? But it won't run constantly at that rate.

It costs about £1.20 to charge the battery and that is done twice a day between 4am and 7am, and 1pm and 4pm. The most electric I pay is to charge the car! I basically don't use any electric at all during the rest of the day (except when it gets really cold as I am finding out now) as the house runs purely on battery. I tend to cook dinner using cheap rate at 16p between 1pm and 4pm when battery is charging. Normal day electric is 26p and 3 hours peak between 4-7pm in 42p. All includes VAT.

So I am paying currently less than £30 a week to heat the house (24hours), which includes heating the water tank for a days hot water and charge my car (about 50-70 miles a day) doing my delivery job. This might go up a little as the temperature drops more, but I'm not expecting to pay much more than £120 a month for the coldest 2 or 3 months of the year. I will confirm that when it really gets cold though!

During the summer the energy company (Octopus) pays me due to the electric my panels generate.

So all in all, during the winter I pay about the same or LESS as an average family with a gas boiler, whom would typically use the boiler a couple hours in the mornings and a few hours at night, plus heating their hot water on the fly but they may have to pay extra on top of that for showers and baths. My heating is 24 hours at 18c during the day and 17c during the night, plus charging the car (putting fuel in) for 300+ driving miles a month, and hot water for the day including up to 3 showers.

Without charging the car it would be more like £50-£60 per month!

Outside of these three months I usually don't pay anything at all as the solar panels provide all the electricity I need, and even exports enough to pay the daily electric tariff charge as well. During the peak summer months I can/do earn hundreds in export tariffs!

Is it worth it, hell yea!

What bills are you expecting per month over the coldest winter?

Hiya Mr Honcho,

Mr Flibble pays about £60 a month (for gas and electric). But he tends to only heat the room he's in with a little electric fan heater. I think he needs a spank for that 😂

Lots of love from Miss K,

XOXO

Exactly what i did last year for the same price, about £60! It was HELL on earth, and having a shower in freezing cold is no joke!

This year I am comfortable for just twice the price (I'm hoping).

Hiya Mr Honcho,

Mr Flibble is a bit funny. He lives in a lovely house and has many lovely toys, but he doesn't mind a bit of hardship (actually, I think he quite likes it ... I'm not quite sure why he is that way ... Dr Kalashnikov the eminent psychologist will work it out!) One warm room is all he needs. And the master bedroom has an ensuite which warms up when he opens the door, so he doesn't have to shower in the freezing cold. Last winter he was paying £2 a month because of the government rebate.

Hiya Mr Karlos,

Mr Flibble hates cold showers. I think it's because his skin temperature is very warm (I love it when he cuddles me, because he's so warm and cuddly 😊.) But he loves warm showers.

And my spankings are doing a perfectly good job, thank you very much. Spank! 😂

Lots of love from Miss K,

XOXO

So they been building this place for the last 2 or three months, but its nearly complete...

It's a 2 story MacDonalds! I have never seen one like this before, they must be expecting A LOT of trade to build such a massive place. It's in the car park of the local ASDA. That car park was pretty full BEFORE this behemoth!

Well, the heating is actually using more electric because it's so cold than I expected. It can use 2.5KW at times, and it drains my battery very quickly. I turned the temp down a little to try and save some hard earned money, lets see how that works.

During the day the solar does help, but today they still had a layer of frost on them at about 10am! That cut the power down to a meega 250W! Hardly denting the 2.5 usage of the heat pump!

Correction, it's -1 outside and my heating is using OVER 3K of electricity, just to heat to 17c!

I'l keep an eye on what all this is costing, but it will be more than I was hoping. However, I am using the heating all dy and night, so can't complain too much.... I guess....

I just turned it down to 16c I can use a blanket LOL

Hope we don't get snow tomorrow as we are out on a job!

Forecast for midlands is sunny all day tomorrow, but looks like it won't get higher than about -4!

We've had freezing rain and sleet, but it's cloudy right now, so not as cold as it has been. Meant no hope of seeing the aurora though.

Livin in an appartment it's not so easy to conserve energy, but exchanged my old fashioned heating thermostats with modern ones from homematic with timers and window sensors. Let's see how it works out. Already have a more consistent temperature throughout the appartment.

Jo

Yea, its been a few years since we've seen these kind of low temperatures. Its really putting the heat pump to the test. However I have put the temp down to 16c now so it hasn't been on again for an hour or so. Its still reasonably warm though even though temp has dropped to 16.5c. its set at 16, i have my blanket all ready, and plenty hot coffee.
I have my place as insulated as you can get, so it retains heat pretty well at night as I have thick thermal curtains over the windows, tucked up on folded blankets on the windowsill to stop cold air from leaking in. My windows are way too big for proper insulation though, new houses the windows are tiny compared!



See how large my rads are? I have 3 in my front room....

Got a job today so wont see me around until late.
I'm sure they'll be lots and lots of posts to get through :)

I moan about how much I'm paying on these cold days, £11 yesterday to heat, charge the home battery twice, heat the water and charge some of the car. But mostly when it's not so cold, it more like £4-£6 which includes charging about 16kw of car battery (£2.50). These next 3 months are going to be the most expensive, but on the otherhand, summer months are usually extremely cheap, free, or they are paying me because of the solar panels.

I did this last year, great for the room you're in, but when you go to another room, it's horrible. Shower in a cold room, horrible. It slows your productivity.

I even had pipes freeze up so there was no water at one point.

The big deal here is really the cold biting wind on the mountain, this is on a good day, it's a long steep climb up the mountain from here, in 4wd, and running on the side of the banks to get grip, no cars ever make it up the mountain, Lady-J

Ohhhh, looks scary. That's the problem with country abodes, great in Summer, can get seriously cut off in winter! It's the one time that 4x4s are warranted, rather than just for taking children to school!

I wish it would snow where I live. I want to try out these all season Bridgestones I’ve got on my Audi A3 Quattro 🙂

Try the Mountain road that will test the Bridgestones for you, but don't go slipping back on the ice, that's really scarey:mad:

Sure no better place in summer Mr Story(y), but winter it's really hard, imagine feeding animals up there on the mountain, in biting cold wind morning and night, but it has it's good times, you need good food lots of it, and yes your so right 4x4 is not for the school run:mad:
Lady-J

I had some bridgestones on one of my scooters. They were horrible even in just rain, way to slippery. I replaced them with Michelin City Grip 2's. Hopefully yours may be better, I'm sure you will get the chance at least once this winter?

We run BF Goodride tyres on the 4x4's round here, they are about the best on road and snow fields, cars don't really matter as we don't take them out much in winter anyway, trouble is nothing is any good on ice, snow we can deal with, there was more last night.

Up here it's better to leve the snow on the roads and have tracks so the 4x4's can grip and still go, there is only one way by road to the farm that's seen in the photo, it just go's to the mountain, years ago it want across the Mountain, the track is stiil there but you can't drive on it, the other way is across our fields and down a long track and out to the road to Longtown, you can then hit the mountain road again, and make your way down and pass Antanasia's castle and on down to the Crown inn seen in many of the Movies.....
There's a a village shop that have just about everything you need, even guns and an armory, just right for me (y) Lady-J

One thing for sure. If it snows where I am, my 400hp rear wheel drive Lotus will definitely be staying put 🙂 (the car is actually super easy to drive, and very safe if you’re sensible, just big fat tyres on a lightweight car isn’t a good combination in the snow.)