Accessorizing the Hearth

I've been collecting stove parts for years before we actually installed our stove. The Jotul that we use now isn't even my first.

I had a Vermont Castings on the porch for a few years that I had bought second hand then eventually resold once my then fiance now husband finally convinced me that wasn't the stove for my house. 

In the mean time I continued to be a collector of all things wood stove related.

Advertised as a mostly complete stove accessory but is it ?

I found this on ebay, @ that time I had no clue how I would ever afford to install a stove but I knew I needed this. I just really really needed this.
I also knew that it had become a one of a kind piece. I bit the bullet and bought it for my as yet un-acquired wood stove for around $50. Then stored it the attic of my house for the next ten years only to be forgotten time & time again until a few days ago.

Clearly it's a ?

Demmler Bros. Pittsburg, Pa. Patented Apr. 20, 1869. Rare to find one with the adjustable stove collar, spine, and adjustable stops. Trivets & stops are cast iron. The spine is metal. Could use a good rub down with stove polish not to mention the Jotul. 

Placed in front of the chimney pipe for photo opp. 

An antique chimney shelf, what every box style stove needs.

After husband made the final placement behind the stove pipe he used a 7" stainless steel hose clamp from the plumbing supply to fasten it around the pipe. 

He promised to keep an eye out of another fastening option in black.

Off grid coffee cup warmer.

The trivets become good & warm never hot despite almost touching the stove pipe. Besides keeping my cup warm the trivets are great for warming mittens and stoppenfloppers.

Forget towel warmers the ultimate in luxurious comfort is a heated stopenflopper.


~~ pelenaka ~~

Off Grid Microwave

Off Grid Microwave a.k.a. firebox on my Jotul 

It's been a crazy Winter this year.
Some days we wake up & realize that we can go without a fire in the stove for most of the day because its so warm out.
K, 50 degrees now is a heat way here in Buffalo. Come May not so much.
Last year when a warm day presented itself (late Spring) I use to just work up a small fire for coffee & oatmeal. Then hang out waiting for it to die down.
I won't leave a fire burning when I'm not home. Houses on my street are too close & too old.
Call it MOCS or Mrs. O'Leary's cow syndrome.

This year I realized that I could convert the firebox in my wood stove to an off grid microwave that accepts metal without sparking.
Water heats up in 3 minutes. I have coffee in less than 5.
After the coffee is done I place a small saucepan with lid in for oatmeal.
But it's really all about the coffee.


~~ pelenaka ~~

Clean Out The Chimney

Apparently in New Zealand the phrase," Clean out the Chimney" refers to meth. 
Here that phrase means that we clean out the pipe much more frequently then the average wood burner due to our burning of less than perfect firewood.
This will make the 3rd chimney cleaning of the Winter heating season.
Hubby refuses to talk cockney to me or wear a top hat made of black construction paper.

If the Ladies Auxiliary of the VLCA stopped in to pay a fine afternoon visit I would certainly be embarrassed by the state of my hearth. Nor would I be able to serve a decent tea. I'd be the subject of neighborhood gossip for weeks. K, not like that's sumting new.

But this is the reality of wood heat. When it's an unusually warm afternoon and all hands are on deck this is what you do before the house chills down below 50.

Stove diff needs a good buffing of stove black. A task better left for another warm afternoon.

~~ pelenaka ~~

Stove Top Oven

One of the many ways that I had planned on increasing the return on our wood stove investment was to use a stove top oven ($30 on gift card) for baking. Easier said than done apparently. My first few attempts were on the cold side with the oven only reaching the 250 degrees when the stove was @ a full fire.
Woods, believes that the poor quality of the wood we have been burning is to blame.
Neither here nor there as I still need to bake.
And we all know that not using the free heat to bake with was driving me crazy Lucy, crazy.
Red silicone baking mats ($15) paper & butterfly clipped in place increased the oven's heat retention.
And yes it took me a good day to figure out what I could use to hold the mats in place.
Stove top oven holds one pie, one 8" cake pan, or two regular loaf pans. It also holds my cast iron muffin pan - 6 small muffins.

Blueberry pie (grew & canned the filling), took over an hour and half to bake. Not as browned on the top crust as I would have liked but the filling was bubbling out so I pulled it. Not as pretty as I would have liked. Only two hearts are perfect.

Whole house smells like pie.



Stove top oven with an added oven thermometer as the door gauge is about 100 degrees too low. I really only use inside thermometer (borrowed from ice box) when I first place a pan in. After that we gauge the baking time by the given bake time then by the scent.
Not an exact science but then wood stove cooking & baking isn't.

Practice practice practice.


~~ pelenaka ~~

Multi tasking G.A. Way

Prior to our home having a wood stove we dried cloths just like everyone in the hood who didn't have a clothes drier, that is to say we used a ghetto clothes drier a.k.a. a heating duct vent or a radiator. Now we do it the Amish way.
Yeah I know but before everyone get's their stopenfloppers in a knot I'm sitting a few feet away multitasking so to speak to the power of 5. Besides laundry there's dough raising in the bread bucket under the huge cast iron skillet which has tarragon dehydrating. Cooking on the stove as well as on a high trivet on the right side of the hearth  is dinner. Me blogging is the final task.
Big push to finish routine chores since tomorrow is pie baking. Also need to install one of my last 3 replacement windows. I can not freakin believe that after 10 years and 12 windows later I will be done!
With windows that is. When I'm actually done with the final room of this house word is that family will box me then stick a couple saw horses under the casket and call it a wake. All the while sipping rum and admiring the wonderfully refinished wood work. 
An added bonus is that I should be getting mullah back from National Grid who is sponsoring an energy incentive program. 30 smackeroos in my back pocket err under the bed. Plus there is still the Energy Tax Credit for 2010.

Catch up - on sabbatical again my home care cased ended. Total roof fund was just over 3 grand before the gods realized I had dead presidents up under my bed. DD#2 needed a few hundred for a XC meet in NYC. She fund raised the majority, is a solid B/C student, & volunteers hours @ church so I splurged. Then the car needed work. And on it went until the fund shrunk by a grand & a quarter.
Past 3 weeks been battling a dental infection which has kept me from gutting the final 3 walls of the living room. Really should have purchased the extended warranty years ago before I started breaking down.
Today we went & rented a storage space ($50) to hold a slightly (installed then returned the next day) used carpet that we scored for $35. I foolishly thought that I could wrap it up in plastic & work around it. Well that & the church pew, coffee table bought from scratch & dent for $70 along with a few other odds and ends. Hard to see the paper trail of where that $1500 went huh.
Storage deal is until January 1st.
Time is wasting anyone seen Norm & the gang from TOH ?
I'm making pie!

~~ pelenaka ~~
who has a clean dry and oh so warm stoppenflopper

hacked ash shovel

This perforated ash shovel isn't an necessity but it is a nice hearth tool to have. After lusting for one last heating season hubby made me one out of our old ash shovel. He would have made it sooner but I wanted to wait until I could replace it with a new ash shovel so I could have both one with holes & one without to clean out the stove. Shopped both tag sales & retail stores - ended up buying new in early Summer when hearth accessories are clearanced, for $2.99 about a dollar more than the used ash shovel we bought @ a flea market.

The perforated ash shovel is nice to have when we have the wood stove fired up 24/7. Before our method of picking out the large embers was to put all the ash in the ash bucket then use old kitchen tongs to pick out the large embers throwing them back into the firebox to start a new fire. The tongs got hot quickly. Not to mention that all that handling of hot embers was a safety issue. And the CO2 detector enviably would alarm.

Thank you my husband.


~~ pelenaka ~~

Stand by my Stove

One major cooking disadvantage to a small wood stove is that for the most part only fit one good sized pot or skillet @ a time. Which works if you cooking up a stew or soup or frying up pancakes. Not so much if you have a steamer going with Broccoli, a skillet with pork chops, and a rice pot. As I'm done cooking one item I slide the pot over to the stand to stay warm and start with the next. It's also nice to have a place to lay down a spoon, hot pad, trivets, or sit my bread bucket on while dough raises.
Have also warmed mittens, socks, and yes unders. Hey much like Marilyn Monroes brilliant idea to cool panties in the dog days of August in her freezer, toasty unders in January are the bomb baby.
This mid sixties mod designed stand bought @ a church tag sale for $2, usually sits next to my garden glider with a potted plant & a few candles or solar light during the Summer. Originally it had only the one middle shelf. The top had a series of vertical pencil sized bars. Hubby added some punch metal pieces to the top & very bottom that he scored from work for a few dollars. This Summer I'll scrub off the rust caused by wet boots & spray paint the whole stand black.
Not a bad hack huh?

~~ pelenaka ~~

Pee'd off Pussy

This is a my red headed stepson Hunter.
He's mad.
The sleep with one eye open mad 'cause it's just a matter of time when payback is a ... mad. The only other time when I've seen him this mad was when I started sleeping with his Dad. Then he'd sit on my night stand staring at me in the dim glow of a street light planning his revenge. I won't mention what he use to do in my pantie drawer under our antique cast iron bed.
Besides the dirty looks he demonstrates his extreme displeasure of a cold stove by series of short pitiful yelps as he stares into the window of the stove. As of this week he has also taken to a slow walk around the stove stopping to inspect each leg. Problem solving no doubt. He's a smart kitty. Thought about popping in a few votive candles to give the impression of fire but he'd realize that I was just ranking his tail so to speak. Then I'd have to sleep in tub with the clothes hamper pushed up against the bathroom door. He's found a way to turn the knob & push open the door.
Breaks my heart almost as much as my cold toes.
Reason for not firing up the stove is that we are down to just a fourth of a face cord of wood which we're saving in case of a power outage. Waiting on federal tax return to buy enough to get us though til spring. Mean while DH has been cultivating bartering deals for firewood which will work for next Winter. If by July we don't have a good supply laid in then we'll buy the rest. Firewood in the off season is usually half the cost.

We burn though the almost 5 face words of firewood that took us 3 years to collect. Wish we had been more aggressive with our gathering. Last big score was by DH who bartered labor for almost a face cord of seasoned Apple wood. After burning Maple & Walnut it was a nice change to have wood that throws off decent heat.
Plans are to continue collecting lesser grade wood to burn in the early Fall & late Spring when it's not as cold, save the good wood for deep Winter. And as always work toward what's free.


Here's the low down on the cost of the stove which includes the stove, all piping/chimney, damper, hearth & labor/permits - $1700. Hate to think what it would have been if we hadn't bought items on sale.


Started heating with wood in November so free heat for 3 months has made a dent with both the electric & gas bill. On average for these past 3 months the electric bill has been under $50. Normally it's over $80 so it has been a $120 savings. This January we used 172 kWh less than in 2009. Blower fan on the furnace is a real power hog.

Important to note is that we didn't heat 100% with wood. I don't like to leave a fire burning when I'm not home. Furnace set to kick on @ 50 degrees. That occurred about twice a week for on average 4 hours.


Here's the comparison broken down between this Winter's natural gas bill & last year's.

Both November 2009 & 2008 were under $75. Rule of thumb for us is the heat comes on when the thermometer its the freezing mark & my toes are cold. This year we fired up the wood stove in the evenings until the end of November when it was 24/7.

December 2009 was an adjusted $50.54 after all was said & done with the new gas meter. For 2008 it was $217.14 a savings of $166.60.
Gas bill for January 2010 was $68.57. It’s been a colder than norm Dec/Jan so we did splurge & tee up the water heater a bit . Down side is that one tends to linger in a hot shower which drives up the water bill.
January 2009 gas bill was $242.14.
Total utility savings for January were $161.54.
Overall total savings worked out to $448.14 or the value of the free firewood. About 1/4 of the cost of the stove has been recouped. Not bad but I had hoped @ least half the cost.

On a positive note much like the concept of family meals we have had a real family bonding experience over our wood stove. It's a natural meeting place. Hence the old adage home is where the hearth is.


~~ pelenaka ~~

Home Fires

This has been a project in the making for almost as long as I have owned this house.

Starting with buying a chimney cleaning brush on clearance in August of 2000. Then there was the bellows bought @ a tag sale four or five years ago. Last year was the class B double walled pipe, thru the wall kit, brackets, and braces.

Then in early October on our way to buy seconds @ an Apple farm in Leroy we stopped into a stove & fireplace dealership. LSS bought a floor model - Jotul F 602 CB. Heats 500 square feet so ruffly half of my home.

After ordering the rear heat shield I think I wrote a check for $800 something. I'll get back on the exact cost after all is said & done since, yeah you guessed it I'll be running a cost comparison. Wood heat vs. furnace.

Furnace hasn't been on since the stove got the heads up from the code man on Tuesday. Granted it has been slightly warmer than norm this month and I also keep that house on the cool side when it's just me during the day.

My brother did the tile work. He's a professional. As you can see it was worth every penny he does beautiful work. Between DH, myself (gofer), my brother, and nephew who actually climbed up on my 12 12 pitched roof the job got done.

As you can see I'm already utilizing the stove for cooking as well as proofing a few loaves of bread (extra large bowl). Far left is a two bed warmers made of soap stone that DH collected years ago. Cast iron tea pot back from China Lake N.A.S. when we had quarters with a fireplace.

Large trivets are actually plant stands from Martha.

Sad irons hmm gotta be from a steam show flea market.

Poker was a gift from a lady who was surprised that I knew what it was. She said it was in the cellar of her 1880's home.

So in honor of our new stove there is a new category - Hearth

~~ pelenaka ~~