Energy saving draft blocker
Monday, January 21, 2008 at 09:42AM Bitter cold weather and drafty old windows and doors--the bane of old house dwellers, as Kim from the Upward Call reminded me this morning.
The past few days have been perfect illustrations of my love/hate relationship with this old house and my drafty old windows and doors.
Our tiny little bungalow has 45 charming windows, all with waver-y glass that fill the house with shimmery, waver-y light on sunny days. The ones on the main floor are nearly all the same size and shape, of the traditional prairie-style bungalow "9 over 1" variety.
When it's cold like it is now or when it's time to put up the clunky old storm windows, we talk about replacement windows, but the cost to replace so MANY windows is daunting and I would would miss my magical, charming, wonderful waver-y patches of light. It's very easy to talk ourselves out of even getting an estimate for the work. (As I've said elsewhere, we are all infinitely capable of justifying and/or rationalizing anything, from theology to replacement windows.)
The doors aren't much better than the windows in keeping out drafts. Our back door is the worst, though, because somewhere in the house's 87 year history, some less than skilled house owner crookedly trimmed the bottom of the door, leaving a huge gap in one corner. The cold air rushes in and chills the tile entry floor right inside the door, making walking in bare feet downright painful.
Today I decided to do something about it. I made myself a rice filled draft blocker.
Rice Filled Draft Blocker Instructions:
Measure the width and depth of your door. Cut a piece of fabric the width of your door plus about an inch for seam allowances. To figure the width of your fabric, take the depth (or thickness) of your door (mine is 2 inches) and add 3 inches (which will make two 1 1/2 inch pockets you will fill with rice) and another 1/4 in for the seam allowance. Multiply this measurement by two.
Iron the fabric and fold in half length-wise, right sides together and sew one short end using a 1/4 in seam allowance, turn and sew along the length of the fabric, creating a long pouch. Turn right side out and iron.
Next, working from the folded edge, mark two sewing lines, the first 1 1/2 inches from the edge and the next one 2 inches over from that (or 3 1/2 inches from the folded edge.) Topstitch on both lines from bottom to top. This will give you a long sleeve with three long, skinny pockets. The middle pocket will not be filled. That's the part that slips under the door.
Now comes the tricky part. (You knew there was going to be a tricky part, didn't you?) You're going to fill the two, smaller pockets that run along the edges with rice. You'll need a funnel for this. Don't try to pour a whole bunch of rice into the funnel--for some reason it doesn't want to work it's way out of the funnel and into the pouch, but it MAY end up all over your floor.
Sprinkle the rice into the funnel a little at a time until you think the pocket is full of rice. It isn't. Pinching the end together firmly with your fingers, bounce the bottom of the pouch against the floor until the rice settles and keep filling until the rice won't settle any more and you've got about an inch of space at the top for turning and closing. Pin securely and repeat the process with the other pouch.
Vacuum up the rice you've spilled because dogs will eat raw rice. Even when you tell them not to. Especially when you are juggling a bag of rice and a funnel.
Now it's just a simple matter of folding the open end over once, zig-zagging it closed, then turning that over once and sewing the whole thing shut. Easy, peasy, one, two, threesy.
Now take your lovely and useful draft blocker to the drafty old in-need-of-a-coat-of-paint back door and install, slipping the middle section under the door and centering it.
The draft blocker stays with the door when you open and shut it. Really. It works.
(The writing of this post took longer than the whole project from beginning to end!)
Reader Comments (7)
Thanks for this brilliant idea, Kim. I'm gonna do it! Our house isn't old, (I adore old houses!) but we still get drafts, especially the one to our unfinished basement.
Now that's slick!
This is a brilliant idea! Our house is a storey and a half, so our attic is not above us, but rather in front, and we get access to it through a closet in our bedrom. There is a door inside the closet and a door to the closet as well. It's a wonderful storage room, but it is not well-insulted, and we figure that is where we losing a lot of heat upstairs. My husband had a towel under the door of the closet because he could feel the cold air coming out from underneath the closet door. This would work very well!
Vacuum up the rice you've spilled because dogs will eat raw rice. Even when you tell them not to. Especially when you are juggling a bag of rice and a funnel.
And especially if your dog is a Beagle!
You are one crafty gal! And I would vote against replacing your windows--they sound beautiful!
COOL craft idea, Kim!! I think that would work much better than the goofy door sweep I installed when I moved in (especially since the door sweep doesn't seem to work AT ALL!).
Cool!... or maybe not.
Hey! Well done!
Very snazzy!