Ayre tight and clear as glahsss...Please roll your "r's".

There was no snow yesterday when I awoke. Whether we even got the predicted flurries is debatable. But the onset of winter has me looking to make the house warmer. One of those ways is to cover the windows.

Now, this being an old house, when we first moved in, we had storm windows. Ah the "joys" of putting the storms on around Thanksgiving or earlier. Storm windows are a limited technology. If warped, as a few of ours became, they didn't fit right and still allowed cold air to enter the house in copious amounts. Enter the wonderful world of TV advertising.

Remember the Scottish guy who demonstrated "Window Insulator Kits"? You know the tag line, "Air tight (thump, thump) and clear as glass." He flicked the plastic twice to demonstrate the seal.

We bought some and, what do you know, they worked. So, every year, in early November, we started watching the sales and when the kits went on sale, we bought some. We always had leftover double-sided tape and sometimes cutting thin plastic film to fit over a window properly was an exercise in frustration, but the end result is worth it. Ace Hardware started making their own kits which the guy in Ace said were 30% smaller than 3M's kits. "Don't believe the packaging when it says it will cover 3 windows. It won't," he told me. Actually, on my size windows, it will. And Ace brand was 15% cheaper than 3M.

Last week, on my Target run, I bought the Duck brand kit you see above. I found some leftover film and had covered the south windows. This kit covered the east window in my bedroom, one of the east windows in the living room, both office windows and the west window in the extra room. I need one more small kit to cover the other east window and the north window in the living room. Then, I will be good.

Do they actually work? I think so. My office windows are notoriously leaking even with repeated caulking. There can be a breeze in the winter which makes doing anything on the computer at night an exercise in one-handed typing while you warm the other. There isn't a breeze in here now. Proof will, of course, be when I get my February heating bill and perhaps I'm kidding myself when I say it feels warmer and I don't think the furnace is coming on as much. So, this coming weekend's task is to get another small kit and finish the job. Plus, I should replace the furnace filter and get salt for the front steps. Then I'm good to go for this winter. Bring it on!

Beverage: Scottish Blend tea

Deb