Keeping Cool Indoors On A Budget

One thing I do during hot weather is to put my pillows in the freezer for an hour or so befor I go to bed. I'll place them inside a black garbage sack and pop that in the freezer for a while. It's so nice to put your head on a cool pillow when your bedroom is far too hot.

 

I actually just purchased some gel pads for mine. While that involves more of a cost than your solution does, I'm finding that they actually stay cool all night long! I am waking up in the morning and just shifting to a different spot on the pillow and it's still cool!!

 

I have been living in the tropics for a long time now. I never liked air conditioners, no matter how hot it gets. My way of staying cool is to have good ventilation throughout the house, light curtains or blinds that can "breathe" easily and mosquito shading to keep out the intensity of the sun. I tend to leave the windows half or a quarter open during the day. At night I open up everything and let the night air clean out the heat of the day. I also drink plenty of water throughout the day and often have short, cold showers.
If it's extremely hot, I sometimes turn on a quiet fan for half an hour or so to freshen up the air.

 

I like to keep the windows open slightly and it depends on how you deal with the heat. I will use air conditioning to cool a room down, because sometimes the hot air outside is worse and a fan is better.

I put on the air conditioning and then a fan to circulate the air and then switch them off once the room has been cooled. Ceiling fans are the best as they require little power, but can keep the temperature lower.

 

I'm originally from Florida so this has always been a constant battle for my family. The number one thing you can do to cut energy cost is to get a ceiling fan. They are energy efficient and very effective. Another thing that we did was to pull the curtains closed over the windows when the sun was shining direct light on them. Keeping the sunrays out helps the house stay cooler. One neat little trick my husband came up with was to make our own homemade AC. Its really simple to do, all you need is a box fan or oscillating fan, 6 or more empty 2 liter soda bottles (milk jugs work well too), and a towel. Fill all the containers up with water, leaving two inches at the top for water expansion, and throw them in the freezer until they are solid frozen. When they are ready, take 3 of the bottles out and place them on the towel on a flat surface. Put the fan behind them, turn it on and presto!!! Home made AC! When the bottles thaw out, replace them with another 3 from the freezer, just put the thawed bottles back in to refreeze and continue the exchange process throughout the day.

 

We have tile floors and sometimes we sleep on the floor to keep cool when the power cuts. This may not be the most comfortable way to sleep but once you get used to it, it beats sitting in a pool of sweat on top of your hot mattress. I have also used the homemade AC method above. And if you put a cool cloth on your wrist and on the back of your neck it will help the body cool itself down.

 

Acclimating to the higher temperature is really important. It's rough while you are doing it, but your blood will thin and you'll soon be much more comfortable at higher temperatures and not need to use the air conditioner so much. I find the best way to do that is when the first hot weather days come around, I keep the socks on if at all possible, don't turn on the AC, just let myself roast for a good part of the day for about 3 days. In that amount of time my body will have adjusted quite a bit and then I'll feel better the rest of the season.

The best time to cool the house down is first thing in the morning, right at dawn or just before. Open all the windows and let the temperature drop as far as possible. Then shut the windows as soon as the outdoor temperature starts to rise a bit and drop the blinds on the East side, or all of them if you are leaving for the day. If you will be home, drop the West side blinds by noon.

 

We live on the top floor and our windows are inclined; we put a towel on them and pour some water on it for cooling down.

 

I personally love ceiling fans for cooling my house. They are very efficient when it comes to cooling down a room because it circulates the air and disperses the hot air getting it away from the highest point in the room. I also like to open the doors and windows because we have screens on all of them and we usually have a slight breeze during the night. Finally if there is not breeze that night, I bring out my box fan. I have a very cost efficient box fan that blows a lot of air and keeps us nice and cool while we sleep.

 

There are a few gadgets out right now that stay your room with cool mist which keep your environment moist and cool, although I've honestly never tried any of these and the ones I've been finding so far are a bit too small so I imagine you'd probably need a bigger one or multiple small ones to make it have an effect on a bigger room, but I'm sure it does contribute to the solution a little bit.

 

If you have rechargeable batteries, then just buy those little solo fans that are battery operated and just use them instead of the electric-operated fans. I think that can save you a substantial amount in electricity.

 

A fan definitely costs less to operate than the air conditioner, so I only use fans.
The only thing I do that could be considered a trick for keeping cool is that I keep a spray bottle of water in the refrigerator and mist myself with the chilled water from time to time.

If it gets unbearably hot at my place, I head to the public library and use their central AC and WiFi.

 

I'm in Texas, and it's pretty hot here much of the year. I have ceiling fans in the main rooms, minus the baths and kitchen, and I leave the upstairs ones on most of the time. I leave the bedroom one on for the cats, and the office one on for me. I'm upstairs much of the time, but when the Summer heat arrives I'll be downstairs more, because it'll be cooler down there (about 10 degrees cooler), so I can save on AC by not using the upstairs as much.

 

One issue I have when the weather gets really hot is that my feet get hot and miserable. I get uncomfortable so I soak my feet in cold water or wrap them in a cold wet towel. I think part of the issue is that my feet get really dry and that is where the uncomfortable feeling comes from.

My husband also taught me to get a cold wet towel and wrap it around my neck, this helps to cool me down too. We have an air conditioner but it is expensive to run and so we only really turn it on in August when the heat is worse.