Why I Oughta...

A couple of days ago, I posted some photos of a snow-downed limb from one of our massive old Oak trees in the yard and mentioned that I was going to cut and begin to dry the limb for firewood. "Cut early.  Burn late." That's what the old-timers say about firewood.  Especially Oak as it takes upwards of a year (or more) to properly season and dry out.  I figured I'd try a little experiment here and monitor how long it would take to dry out and get down to where the seasoned wood that I buy is when it arrives (under 15% moisture ). You can see in the photo above, that this Oak firewood is measuring 24.5% on the C setting of my moisture meter.  I'll try to measure these pieces of Oak over the next year and see if we can establish the timeline for seasoning downed Oak limbs. Below, you can see some of the pile that I've made out of the limb.  Some of it has naturally split while other parts of it are narrow enough to not have to split. I've be

Exactly one year ago, I posted photos and details of our annual firewood delivery from Best Firewood and talked about how we went with Cherry and Birch as our early season woods.  When we built our house, Nat insisted on a wood-burning fireplace with a masonry chimney.  We have one in our family room and we use the one on our screened porch.  When we bought the lot, there was a little bit of wood that had been cut down that was laying around.  Our firewood journey began with that inherited lot and some chopping in November of 2017 .   That lasted us until about mid-December.  And got us going in terms of burning fires most days we're home during the Winter.  Since then, we've had wood delivered each season that we've lived in our new house in Downers Grove starting with a mixed Face Cord that we had delivered right around Christmas of 2017 .   From there, I've done check-ins on our consumption including: February 2018 consumption check Delivery in October

Just two weeks ago, I shared a photo in my ongoing tracking of our firewood consumption and mentioned that we had mostly exhausted our Fall supply of Cherry and Birch that we had delivered and stacked in our screened porch and side porch.  This photo you see above is from a week or so ago after we had a second, late-Winter delivery of another Facecord of firewood from Best Firewood in Aurora.  This would be the third Facecord of wood that we've worked through since early October.  That's four months - at approximately 1/2 of a Facecord per month.  The supplier that we use has a different type and caliber of wood available in late January/early February vs. what they have in September and October.  So, this order included a wood that we haven't bought before:  Oak.   This is a Facecord that is split 50/50 between Oak and Cherry.  But, the Cherry is *different* than the Cherry we had delivered in October.  If you look at the rack in on the right, you will see the to

It appears that I didn't do a proper firewood consumption check-in post in the month of January this year as the last time I posted a photo of the wood racks was late December of 2018 .  Here's a photo that I took a few days ago that shows only the largest rack closest to our family room.  Why?  Because the other two racks (the one outside and the other one in our screened porch) are both empty.  Above, you can see a small pile of Cherry left on top and a small pile of Birch on the bottom.  This won't last long. Compare the quantity in the photo above to where we were last February 8th when we were using the larger, metal, traditional rack .  My assumption is that the cold Winter isn't going to snap into Spring anytime soon, so I've placed an order with Best Firewood to replenish the racks.  Unfortunately, the *good* Cherry as well as the Birch firewood are all sold out for the season.  So, the backfill order was a Face cord that is split between Cherry (the

The last time I posted in the [ firewood consumption ] diary was back in the very beginning on November of this year.  At that time ( post here ), I had not touched the two 'indoor' racks (indoor meaning inside the screened porch) and had worked my way through about half-way of the outdoor third rack.  Today, I'm documenting where we are right ahead of Christmas. In today's post there's only two photos of the inside racks.  That's because we've totally consumed the outdoor rack in its entirety.  And we're working against the two indoor racks.  The top photo shows where we are in the smaller rack - with about half of that wood consumed.  The bottom portion remaining is Cherry.  Below, the second photo shows the full 'big' rack that shows we've mostly NOT touched this rack with Cherry on top and Birch on the bottom.  Feels like we've gone through about 'half' of the wood, doesn't it?  Last year, we had a Face Cord

Just a few days back, I posted a link to these DIY firewood rack brackets that Menards was carrying on their site .  I ordered five sets and got busy working with three of them.  Here, above, is a work-in-progress show that shows the position of one of the racks that I'm building.  This one is the one right outside of the family room door and I've built the rack in a vertical orientation.  I ended up using some rough sawn cedar that was left over from my fence installation, but that move caused some issues.  Turns out, rough sawn cedar 2x4's aren't the same size as normal, dimensional construction lumber.  They're a bit bigger.  Not true two inches by four inches, but bigger by just a hair.  Here's the height difference.  On the left is a traditional, Home Depot bought 2x4.  On the right is a rough sawn Cedar 2x4.  And the thickness difference. I first went to Home Depot and the one by us has just an indoor lumber yard, so they have limited su

Image of firewood rack via Menards (not my photo above) Last year was our first Winter in our house and was also the first year where we ordered a Face Cord of firewood.  I documented that Face Cord - and the location of the rack - here on the blog .  I set up our only rack in our screened porch, where it was covered and protected from the elements.  But last year we didn't have any furniture in the porch, so it was easy to do.  This year?  Nat has set up the room with a full set of furniture and even an indoor/outdoor rug.  So, that means space is limited inside.  At the same time, I've considered firewood rack options - including posting some inspiration here on the blog .  The placement of the rack has been bouncing around in my brain for the better part of the Summer.  I want to put it in a place that is protected from the elements, but not too far from the door because I know I'll want to walk out there in my house shoes to grab wood for the fire.  Also, I know