Keeping the wood stove going

Those kindling bundles I made during the past year have been excellent in starting our wood stove, and far more convenient than rummaging out a handful of twigs from the wood pile.  I trim a handful of dry sticks, up to pencil thickness, to about 30 cm long (a good size for the stove);  I then wrap a strip of a dry yucca leaf around the handful and twist the ends together, tucking them in to keep it nice and tight.  The bundles then go to the wood pile in their own convenient stack.  

It's true they are somewhat time consuming to make.  However, one thing I like to do on nice days is sit in the sunshine in my garden;  these are good days to make a few kindling bundles if I have any twigs on hand.  I'll collect my materials next to my comfy garden chair and make some at my own relaxed pace.

I have a couple of overgrown hawthorns at the hedge at back, earmarked for a hard pruning this winter once all their leaves have fallen.  Although hawthorn is a good dense wood and a quick grower--and takes pruning very well--its slight drawback is it doesn't grow very straight.  It has fierce thorns and can grow in some pretty strange contortions, making it less desirable for firewood.  Nevertheless, it will go into the green wood pile for next winter--and I'll try to negotiate with those thorns to make some more bundles.

As well as keeping us warm, we heat water on the stove for hot drinks, cooking, washing dishes;  we also do occasional cooking (I will hard boil eggs on top, for instance, and we've even baked pizza in the firebox--now that's an exciting meal!); we dry laundry on racks in front of it, and I've even dehydrated vegetables above it.  Although we have to buy in fuel to run the stove, I don't mind spending a few hours throughout the year making the prunings from my garden into bundles to keep the stove going.