This photograph represents six months of procrastinating, followed by two days of tiling and measuring and pipe fitting, working long into the night under threat of rainclouds and possible snow, with holes in the floors big enough for toddlers to fall through, and holes in the roof which are too big at any size. But it was all worth it, friends! At long last, our woodburning cook stove is cooking away in our big country kitchen. Upstairs, where the chimney runs through a corner of a children’s bedroom, we’ve installed a heat reclaimer which will, hopefully, pump the heat that would normally be lost through the roof into the upstairs, which gets dreadfully cold on these sunless winter days. Tomorrow, I might even try cooking something on it. Providentially, I’ve got a pretty good cache of cast iron cookware. 
Gorgeous!
I’m so happy it’s up and running. What time is breakfast??!!
You better hold off till we know what we’re doing. For instance, the stove, after not being fed all night, is now cold. Breakfast is going to be a little late.
What a beautiful stove! It’s always been my dream to cook on a woodburning stove. Can’t wait to read about what you cook on it!!!
I boiled some water for tea… Does that count?
A wood cookstove! That’s pretty intense. Will you be moving it outdoors in the summer then? Where will you get your wood?
I used to make lefse on a woodstove w/ my mom as part of a hertiage demonstration at a historical village. It kicks out the heat, for sure!
I weighs a ton, Sarah. It’s staying right where it is from now until the end of time.
Wood is cheap or free around here. On the off chance we can’t locate a super local source, we can go logging on Fort Knox for $5 a load. Not bad, and it’s a really good family day, believe it or not!
Excuse my ignorance…is this your only stove/oven now? How do you regulate temperature? It is beautiful!
We still have an electric range which we’ll hopefully be able to trade out for a gas range soon. As far as I know, you regulate the stove top temperature by just moving your pot nearer to or farther from the firebox. The oven hasn’t gotten up to a cooking temperature yet, so I don’t know about that. I am now in need of a woodstove cookery book.
Gorgeous stove!!! i SO love what you are doing..the farm, the chickens, the cow , the kids, the husband and now…the stove. (wait…was that sentence really, really awkward???)
ANYWAY – thanks again for sharing!!!!!
You’re welcome! But I have to warn you: this life of simplicity is a lot of hard work.
It is beautiful…can a stove be considered a piece of art?
We think so.
Definitely!
So, if you still have an electric/gas range, what is the purpose of the wood stove? Other than aesthetics, of course!
We have an electric range, and wouldn’t you know, it doesn’t work when the power is out? Crazy. And it’s kind of hard to cook on a grill for any length of time. Funtion #1: Alternative cooking surface.
Last year, we spent $400 every six weeks on propane to heat the house. Granted, a faulty thermostat was probably causing us some serious inefficiencies, but we’re wanting to eliminate, or at least seriously reduce, the propane heating bill. This stove is rated to heat 2600 sq. ft., and wood ranges in cost from free to very cheap. Function #2: Cheap heat.
So far, we’re pretty happy with it on both counts.
Oh, Jenny, she’s beautiful! Keep us updated on how the cooking goes. I would like to have one of these, someday. I’ll tell you what our ‘eventual’ plan is, concerning the heat in the summer. We are planning to have a summer kitchen. This is basically an outdoor kitchen that is semi-protected from the elements, and cuts down on the heat.
A summer kitchen would be really neat, especially at canning time, but I don’t see anything like that being in the cards for us. I think that stove will just be an attractive ornament come summer time.
I’m jealous, that stove is gorgeous! Before we moved down south, our old house in NJ was heated by an old woodburning stove. We couldn’t cook on it, but for the entire time that we lived in that house, 12 years and my husband grew up in that house, we never turned the heat on once in the winter. Sure it would be a little chilly in the morning (you actually had to wear slippers and a housecoat), but by lunch time if you were sitting in the living room you were sitting there in shorts and a tank top! There are certain woods that burn hotter than others depending on how HOT you want to get the house and what you’re trying to cook. At the moment I can’t remember all of the really good ones for cold winter days, but I will ask my husband because he’s the one that split the wood and stacked it inside and out of the house according to what the weatherman said the temperature was going to be for each day and e-mail it to you.
Thanks! And that was really sweet of your husband, making sure you were all set for the day.