HOUSE RULES
(1) No Smoking in the house.
(2) No outside fires in the firepit without a town fire permit. (Use a charcoal grill for barbeques)
(3) Remove shoes before going upstairs.

DOORS/WINDOWS
Do not force windows open, they have small limiters on the right and left sides which may be extended - check first and push them in if you want the windows wide open. Also, the locks on the windows have push buttons on the locking levers to release them. The sliding doors, the french door and the hall door all have a European locking system. You must pull up the lever handle all the way up while simultaneously turning the deadbolt, in order to lock them. The side garage door must be held tightly closed while operating the keypad-coded deadbolt, or the bolt will not fully extend - either push on it from the outside while opening or locking - or pull tightly from the inside.

FOOD & OTHER CONSUMABLES
Feel free to eat any food left in the refrigerator unless specifically labeled. Throw out dubious and disgusting stuff. Feel free to use pantry food too, but try to replace any staples you use up. We have at least one bear on the property as well as mice. Please do not leave food out on the deck or the screened porch overnight. We provide soap, paper towels, toilet paper, but please replace if you use it up.

LAUNDRY
We provide sheets and towels. The sheets for the downstairs bedroom are in the laundry room, as are general purpose towels for swimming, etc. Sheets and towels specific for the upstairs rooms are in the closets in the appropriate rooms, as are extra blankets. In the suite, the towels and sheets are in the drawers located inside the half-bath. The cleaning service will come on the weekend and change sheets. If there is a changeover midweek, you will have to strip the bed yourself and put new sheets on. Throw your dirty linen in the laundry hamper under the shelf in the laundry room. Any towels that you want cleaned should be put there as well. If you want to do the laundry yourself, feel free. If you do a lot of your own dirty clothes, consider buying some extra detergent.

APPLIANCES/CLEANING
Please keep the stovetop clean. No abrasive cleaners, please, use soap and water. The CeramaBrite in the drawer to the right of the stove is also very good - just apply with a cloth or paper towel. The instructions for all appliances are in the drawer under the microwave. In addition to the major appliances, there should also be a toaster, waffle iron, coffee maker, iron, clock radios in each room, and a big 'ole radio.
The cement floor has a wax on it, so do not use harsh chemicals to clean it or you may strip the wax. Soap and water or a sweeping up is all you should have to do.

TRASH
In the garage there are 2 bins for recycling. Glass goes in one, and cans and plastic containers in the other. Please rinse before sticking them in the bins. Paper can be stacked in the cardboard box in the garage. Everything else is considered garbage and should be bagged and temporarily put in the bin labeled garbage in the garage. Eventually all this stuff must go to the dump. We don't mind taking the recycling to the dump, but to make life less aromatic for everyone, we suggest that you take your garbage with you to work and stick it in the dumpster at the top of the Soudan mine road, just to the left of the parking lot entrance.

HEATING/COOLING/ELECTRICITY
The circuit breaker is in the Utility Room just to the right of the stairs. All heating and water is there too. The house is equipped with 2 independent heating systems: infloor heat in the downstairs concrete floor and forced air heat and air conditioning upstairs. It also has an air exchanger which controls humidity.

The infloor system uses an electric mini-boiler controlled by the leftmost thermostat in the front hall near the laundry room. It should stay off in the summer. It has a separate electric meter called Freedom Heat located on the outside south wall of the house. It takes hours to heat a concrete slab (and hours to lose the heat) so there is not much point in tweaking that thermostat when you leave for work. Reduce it only if no one will be in the house for several days.

The forced air system works on geothermal heat from our outside well. It provides heat in the winter and air conditioning in the summer. It is the big tan square box in the utility room. The thermostat for this is located UPSTAIRS, just inside the door to the Master Suite on the right hand wall. Please turn this down when you leave for work in the winter (or off in the summer if you are using it to air condition!).

The air exchanger is the big cube suspended at eye level in the utility room. There are controls in the bathrooms - if you press them, the fan stays on for 10 minutes to clear the air of humidity and smells, then automatically shuts off. The main control is the rightmost control in the front hall. You want to leave the controls on auto and the humidity in the comfort zone and forget about it. If the windows fog up in the winter, then consider adjusting to dry and leaving fans on "max".

There is a "fake" control between the left and right controls in the front hall. It doesn't do anything.