had access to wood either from my own yard or from my folks'.
We started burning fires in early October this year; never turned the heat on until mid November, so burned a lot of fires for those six weeks to get some heat into the house. It was all pine that had come down in a January 2014 snowstorm. The wood was very dry and I could easily get the first floor up from 60 degrees to well over 70. My kids loved it and started lighting the fire themselves in the mornings or when we came home in the evening.
Once we burned through that I went up to my folks' and split a b unch of oak that they'd had taken down 2/3 years back. It hadn't been split and stacked so it's not as dry as it should be. Gotta run up there and get another load or two, keep it stacked out on my porch to get it as dry as possible before burning.
Have 't had a fire since turning the heat on, but we'll get back to it.