Meet Sidney Slug our Smart Draft Excluder.

This is Sidney our smart draft excluder…

A smart draft excluder, is there such a thing? Well yes of course there is!

May I introduce to you our smart draft excluder Sidney the giant slug. We realised Sidney was smart when we found out he is a member of a highly trained, elite squad of draught excluders. They are called the E S E’s aka the Essex Squad of Excluders! He zips around the house sniffing out draughts and instantly excludes them, a rare talent indeed!

Seriously though folks, he does help save us energy because he stops the warm air escaping and the cold air coming into the house.

More Energy saving tips

As mentioned above a draught excluder is a very simple method of insulating your home as it blocks the draughts that let the heat out and the cold air in.
Our heating is on a timer with a sensible time schedule, that ensures we are not heating an empty house. we have also recently turned it down a few degrees!
We always try to remember to turn lights off as we leave the room.
I am also proud to say that every single light bulb in our house is an Led. (light emitting diode) bulb that uses low energy.

I have recently been reading about smart meters and how they can encourage energy saving behavior. Smart meters measure how much gas and electricity you’re using, as well as what it’s costing you, and display this on a handy in-home display. You can easily spot days when you have been using lots of energy and change your behavior to reduce your energy consumption!

Do you have any other suggestions for energy saving tips?

Watch Sidney’s latest Video…

If you enjoyed my little video maybe you would like to subscribe to my channel as there will be more crochet ones coming soon!

Would you like to make your own version of Sidney?

Here is how I did it…

First let me mention that My Giant slug is based upon an original slug pattern called ‘Hannah the slug’ and is designed by Stacey from fresh stitches I have made this much larger by changing a few things but it is Stacey’s pattern!

I used two balls of this yarn for the slugs body plus his bits and pieces. and a small amount of the cream for the eyes. If you have any scraps left over from another chunky project, to use for the edging on his frill, that will look nice but is optional.

One pair of large safety eyes and a bag of toy stuffing (both from Hobbycraft) I used the whole 250g bag.

My alterations to the pattern:

The first thing I changed was the yarn. I used a ‘super chunky acrylic yarn from stylecraft. Next came the hook size I upgraded the size to a 9mm and I also kept the stitches tight.
Then using your own judgement simply extend the pattern instructions to your liking. Add extra rounds to adjust the length if needed.
The frill is made by first dc around base of slug and then going round again and working two trebles into each dc. add a dc edging to this if preferred.