Winterizing Your Home in 5 Steps

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Sadly, winter is upon us.  Some people love winter, but I am not one of them.  I don’t mind the chill in the fall, but the days of dead grass, dreary skies, muddy snow are endless in Utah.  But it’s part of life, so I’m going to help you winterize your home in five simple steps.  It’s a little winterization checklist, if you will.  And be sure to enter the giveaway for the Home Winterization giveaway at the end of the post!

This post includes affiliate links, please see my disclosure.

Step 1:  Stop cold air from getting in the house

The best way to survive winter is to have a nice cozy house.  Stop the drafts from crack and gaps between window frames and doors by using a sealant, like DAP Dynaflex Ultra Advanced Exterior Sealant.  You also want to fill larger gaps (usually from plumbing, electrical, cable, and phone services) with a foam filler (I recommend DAP MaxFill Triple Expanding Sealant).  It expands three times bigger for an air-tight seal.

Step 2:  Protect water pipes

The first thing you might think is unscrewing hoses and getting sprinklers blown out (which is good and recommend.)  But if your internal house pipes burst, it can cost a fortune to replace.  If you locate pipes in your house that pass through unheated areas (such as crawlspaces or cold storage) you can insulate them with foam rubber sleeves or fiberglass insulations.

Step 3:  Pest Defense

We had a major mice problem when we first moved into our house five years ago and I’m still traumatized.  It took us like two years to get rid of them, but the best thing we did was to find all the spots on the outside of the house where a mouse could possible come in and seal it off with a foam insulation.  I recommend using DAP Mouse Shield, as it’s specially treated to block mice, birds, bats, squirrels, roaches, spiders, bees, ants, etc.  It also doubles as extra insulation to help your house be more energy efficient.

Step 4:  Clean your furnace filter

If you don’t have a clean filter, your furnace is working twice as hard to heat up the house.  We are guilty of not changing our filters often enough but it’s so worth it.  They work best if the filter is changed once a month and I’ve actually heard that the cheaper filters can work better.  You should also have your furnace serviced every few years to make sure it’s up to snuff.

 

Step 5.  Check smoke and carbon monoxide detectors.

You might not think of this one, but when you’re using your heater all the time in the winter, there is also more risk for carbon monoxide poisoning incidents.  Make sure these detectors are working properly by using the test button and replacing the batteries if they need it.  If you don’t have a carbon monoxide protector, you can get one for about $14 on Amazon.

Bonus steps for Winterizing Your Home:

Put outdoor furniture pads and pillows into storage and cover outdoor furniture, grills, and fire pits with tarps and covers.  This helps decrease the wear and tear on them.  Also we usually wrap some of our evergreen trees with burlap to protect them from getting eaten by deer.  We live in the foothills where this is a problem and on the years we haven’t done this, we have sad eaten trees and one even died from it.

I hope these tips and steps were helpful in you winterizing your home this year.  You can rest a little easier knowing that your home was properly prepared for the winter!  To help with the winterization process, the awesome folks at DAP want to giveaway a Warm Winterization Kit to one lucky winner!  You will receive everything you see here which includes a FOUR super-soft and fuzzy sherpa blankets, Ironclad work gloves, Hot Feet heated socks, Ghirardelli hot chocolate mix, and of course DAP products–Dynaflex Ultra, MaxFill, and Mouse Shield.  Enter below!

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