The Best Ways to Stay Comfortable as the Seasons Change
Ahh, autumn. There’s a pleasant chill in the air. Every weekend is full of football games. Halloween stores start popping up all over town. All foods are available in pumpkin spice flavor, including bubble gum.
But hold up. You may be mentally ready for the seasons to change, but what about your house? You’ve been running the air-conditioning all summer, but are you ready to turn off the air and turn up the heat? Literally turn up the heat?
Figuring out the transition from warm weather to cool weather to cold weather and back again is always a bit tricky. Some nights it’s too cold for the air-conditioning but too warm for the heat (leading white-noise enthusiasts to just turn on a small fan to help lull them to sleep). Depending on what part of the country you’re in, it can be 40 when you’re getting ready for work and 75 by the time you go on your lunch break. It’s frustrating, but the one thing that will make it more frustrating is if you go to turn on your heat and nothing happens.
If something’s broken, you want to get it fixed before the snow starts falling and the ice starts forming. Contact a reliable HVAC service that can come out and figure out what’s going on. HVAC stands for Heating, Ventilation, and Air Conditioning, so they’re the guys you want to turn to when the temperature inside your house isn’t right, and when you can’t seem to do anything to make it right (they can’t intervene in familial disputes about the thermostat, though, no matter how often your dad tells you “just put on a sweater!”).
When the dark, cold days of December arrive, you’ll want to come home to a house that’s already warm or can reach that point quickly. If you choose to supplement your primary heating mechanism with small space heaters, be careful. Read and follow the warnings on the box. Don’t put them near anything that can burn, like rugs or paper. And don’t leave them unattended when you go out. It doesn’t matter if you’re just going around the corner to buy a cup of coffee. If no one is there, the space heater should be turned off.
Once winter hits, you’ll probably be dreaming of tropical weather, including a nice getaway to a beach filled with palm trees. If you want a tropical ambiance without getting on a plane, winter is actually a good time to start looking into installing a pool or spa for your home. You can huddle with your family and decide which option is right for you, and then start calling experts to help you out By the time spring rolls around, you’ll already have spent months preparing and be ready for workers to start the initial work. Designing the pool or spa will both pass the time in winter and give you something to look forward to once the ground warms up and people start ditching their sweaters in favor of T-shirts.
In some parts of the country, fall lasts several months, giving people plenty of time to drink hot apple cider as they watch the trees change color. In other, more northern climates, fall lasts maybe a month before the snow starts falling and the cars start wearing their winter tires. Regardless of which part of the country you live in, you can start planning now to make sure you and your family will be safe and cozy when that first cold front hits. Sure, winter is approaching quickly, but spring won’t be too far behind it.
