Painting, Solar Cooking, and Hot Water

We spent today painting our house.   It’s starting to really come together and look nice.   We’re doing the same colors that were already there, but the new paint looks all shiny and fresh.   The sides that are finished look fantastic – the trim really makes it look great.   We should be able to finish it next weekend.

While we were working on the house, I cooked a big pot of brown rice in our solar oven.   It’s in the fridge now, ready for beans or stir fry this week.   We should have enough for about three meals, and it got cooked for free in the sun.   No heating up the house, no electricity used – love it.

Yesterday we turned down our hot water heater.   Don’t know why we’ve never done that before… We’ve lived in this house more than five years, and never checked the setting on the hot water heater.   My husband crawled under the house to check it, and it was nearly at the highest setting (it has “hot”, A, B, C, “very hot” and ours was set at “C”).   So he turned it down to the lowest setting – “hot” – and it’s been just fine.   I wonder how much energy that’s been wasting for the last five years? :(   But at least it’s fixed now.

In addition to the rice, yesterday I cooked a pan of oatmeal raisin bars in the solar oven.   I used a regular recipe and baked them for about 40 minutes at about 300 degrees.   Turned out fantastic – I am very sold on the solar oven.   I haven’t tried any yeast breads yet, but one of these days I will.