IM proud of my son...

[ozarkjeep]

He and his little sis are out of school today, snow day.

wife works nights, so she is upstairs asleep.

I fed kids, built a fire, and left for work.

I called a few times and had son check the temp on top of insert with harborfreight IR temp gun.

when it was burned down to coals, he disengaged cat, open air full cracked door, and reloaded the insert.

when I came home from lunch he was just finishing the char and about to re-engage the cat. I noticed smoke when I drove in, so I knew he has added some fresh wood.

good to know, the little guy can keep up with things when im out of pocket.

he is almost 12, and has been helping me stoke the fire for a couple of years now.

 

[j00fek]

ahh the days when dad let me stoke the fire. first i had to cut,stack,pile the wood then i was taught to light the stove then i finally got to put wood in the stove when i was about 10. used to have a 1900's ish wood boiler setup.

only thing i hated was cleaning it every fall...but knowing all this is good

 

[savageactor7]

It's all in the training ozarkjeep...good job.

 

[ozarkjeep]

He does help split and stack, and ive gone so far as to let him start up one of the smaller hain saws, he wanted to see if he could pull it hard enough.. no cutting for him yet though.

yep, it makes me relax a bit more at work, knowing he is looking after things when Im not around.

ahh the days when dad let me stoke the fire. first i had to cut,stack,pile the wood then i was taught to light the stove then i finally got to put wood in the stove when i was about 10. used to have a 1900's ish wood boiler setup.

only thing i hated was cleaning it every fall...but knowing all this is good

 

[jadm]

He does help split and stack, and ive gone so far as to let him start up one of the smaller hain saws, he wanted to see if he could pull it hard enough.. no cutting for him yet though.

yep, it makes me relax a bit more at work, knowing he is looking after things when Im not around.

My 12 year old loves building fires too....unless I ask him to do it!

Loves chopping kindling out of pine splits too. Uses a small hatchet. I looked for a maul today but they were too heavy for small job he is doing. Got him a mini-maul that looks like a small hatchet - 4 pounds...but he likes the regular hatchet. Oh well.

I have a mini - alligator chain saw that I let him use when we are cutting small 2-3 inch rounds. He is very good at it. I feel pretty comfortable with him using it when I am around. NO big chain saws here - scare me too much. :ahhh:


I'm working on his 15 year old sister...so far she shown absolutely no interest what so ever....but she loves the heat from the fire.

 

[Adios Pantalones]

Good stuff. My memories of gathering/splitting wood and keeping a fire when I was a kid are some of my favorites.

 

[polaris]

Tha's great. Good for you for properly training him and knowing he was trustworthy enough to handle it. I've got a 10 year old who reloads for me but I have no cat and I still check to see if he has reduced the the air inlet.

 

[Cearbhaill]

If any of y'all want to give me a few pointers on training my 48 year old husband, I'm all ears.
He loves to poke it and load it but forgets to remember to come back and check it and turn the air back down.

To him saying "sorry" means everything is OK.
Not with fire, dear, it's too important to forget.
And that's why I am the firekeeper in this house

 

[joesat78]

Reminds me of my son... he is 17 months and helps me light the insert

When I tie knots in news paper - he carries them and throws inside the insert. He cries and creates a big drama (involves my wife) at home if I don't allow him to do that. On one such instance he threw a mug of coffee on the hot insert as I din't allow him to help me fire it.

Well, he was born on July 4th - saw lots of "fire"works from the hospital window the day he was born