I live in MI and want to beef up my winter preps.
So far I have a buddy heater and about 2 dozen 1lb propane canisters.  I’m thinking of adding the tubing that allows you to use a full propane tank and then a few big tanks stored in the shed.  Ideally I would like to have a wood burning stove, but this house couldn’t support it (not big enough)
I also have a bunch of blankets and decent hunting gear for cold weather. I’m gonna stock up on gloves and hats (those always go missing)
What else do you guys have?

1. A way to partition off the house so that you are heating a much smaller area. Take care to ensure the sink cabinets for bathroom and kitchen are in this area so you can keep them from freezing.

2. Enough blankets, quilts and sleeping bags for everyone in the house. Then did 25% or more to that number. Everyone requires a different level of warmth so to speak. My ex only wanted a light blanket most nights and gave off enough heat I barely needed more. If she wasn’t there for I needed 2 blankets and a quilt.

3. Socks and hats for sleeping. I have an oversized pair of raggwool socks I use for sleeping in the extreme cold and sometimes grab them on cold nights.

4. Stocking hats for sleeping.

5. 1 good heavy down coat for every member of the household. Plus a couple
Of spares if you can afford them.

6. Gloves of all kinds from heavy ski gloves down to mechanix gloves. I always have a couple of pairs of fleece gloves around and I swear I use them more than all the others combined.

7. As much propane as you can legally store. If you get a power outage you may have to cook with it as well. Also a good Coleman white gas stove and as much white gas as you feel comfortable keeping.

Get a good kerosene heater.

You likely have enough stuff in your house to make a small area to heat with your little buddy.

get 2 co2 monitors and store them with a pack of unopened lithium batteries.

Find where your water main shutoff is..then find out where any of your pipes run into outside walls, (trace stuff, look in basement/attic) make a map. These will freeze first.

When pipes freeze they don't always burst like a movie. They start spraying when they thaw out enough.

Find Out if there are water shutoffs to turn off sections of your house.

buy a case of Rv antifreeze. You can turn the water off to that section of your houses drain the tank, and use the antifreeze in your toilet bowl if you 'abandon' a section of your house.

but a kerosene heater at your local farm store and 4 jugs of kero.

plan out what size inverter generator you need to run your furnace, also buy a tri fuel conversion for said generator.

hat gloves etc are the easy things.

Make sure your propane in the little bottles will work in the cold.
Most will not.
Woodstove is better. They make some really nice small ones now.
Multiple winter boots with replacement liners so you can swap out.

They don’t handle the cold well.  A trick we use at hunting camp is to heat them up with a hot pack or to book water and soak a towel with boiling water.  Then wrap the propane with the hot towel. That should get you enough time to get the heater fired up.

Purchasing the adapter and tubing to use a refillable propane tank is far more cost effective than purchasing additional 1 lb propane tanks.

A small propane tank holds 1 lb of propane.  It will cost you about $ 4.00

To purchase a new 20 lb propane tank (common grill size), it will cost you about $ 35.00 empty.  It will cost you about $ 15.00 to fill it.  Initial cost of a new tank and propane $ 50.00 or $ 2.50 a Lb.

Second fill will cost you about $ 15.00 for 20 lbs of propane.  Cost per lb is now reduced to 75 cents, or 1/5 the cost of the 1 lb disposable tanks.

You can purchase an adapter to refill the 1 lb propane tanks ( about $ 12.00 ), however it is difficult to get them completely full.  Freezing the small tank while keeping the larger tank warm helps.  I have found that as the small 1 lb propane tanks are used multiple times, they may develop leaks in the top seal.  If they are connected to an appliance with a shut off valve this is not a problem, however for unattached storage it can be.  The way around this is to have a ( or several) 20lb or larger tank and refill the 1 lb tanks on an as needed basis.

If you chose to, this would give you the ability to fill 1 lb containers for other people if you had that need.

What's not big enough - the stove or the house?

The house.

Can you make a camping word burning stove work in your house?  It could sit in your garage until you need it.

The main issues are venting out of the house or possible draft problems coming down from the roof.  Proper insulation of the walls around it is another problem that needs to be solved if this isn't a permanent build.

Seems odd. I have a wood stove in one of my deer shanty’s. Might be all of 36 sq’

Could I perhaps have the materials on hand to run a vent pipe out the roof?  I have room for that I think.

Wood stove suggests winter heat, so I wouldn't plan on trying to cut through the ceiling & roof while properly sealing and protecting said ceiling/roof during/after a blizzard/ice storm that took out your regular heat.

Could you run the pipe at 45 degrees out a double-hung window with proper thermal protection and enough length to clear the roof?  You'd need to somehow support the pipe.

I once had a pipe dream of getting a second door and having the exhaust pipe through that.  
When I need to use it I got the door out of the shed and put it on the hinges. I don’t know the specifics behind my plan.  Just an idea I had once.

If your HVAC furnace is gas, then wire it up to run on a generator.  Then get a generator and gasoline.

While that helps with power outages. It does nothing if the gas goes out. It almost happened last year.

You wouldn't need a door since you wouldn't be walking through that while using the stove.  You would want something to seal the opening, insulate from the cold outside, allow the smoke outside and not burn from the exhaust.  I don't know the exact composition or how you would construct it.

Maybe you've already done this, but since you mentioned hunting gear ....

I know some old guys who've hunted different areas in the U.P for years. One had a cabin or camper site up there where he would stay for a while, mainly just to get away from his wife.

Anyways, all their hunting rifles (and other firearms they bring up) are lubed with the serious 'arctic'/low-temperature stuff. One guy hunts with his M1 Garand, and he uses the 'extreme low-temp' Lubriplate grease, not the standard G.I.-type grease.

Similar extreme low-temp oil is available if you don't want to use grease.

Just a thought ...

Good point. Hadn’t thought of that

if youre going to run a Buddy heater on a hose, get the actual hose not a generic, there have been issues with the generic hoses leaching junk into the filters of Buddy heaters and causing them to stop working......

As someone who heats with a woodstove some of these posts about setting up a temporary one scare me.

If your going to use a woodstove in a house, do it right.

A very basic woodstove properly installed is not that expensive.

In my AO where depending on the year we may have snow for 7 months one of the most common causes of house fires is a fire place or woodstove.  Using some type of tent or temporary wood stove in your house does not put the odds in ones favor.  I am not posting this to be a dick, I am posting it because its true.

Use a buddy heater, use a generator or have a woodstove installed that's up to code.

I have spent many a night in an outfitters tent with a temporary woodstove.  Not something I would ever bring into my house.  JMHO.

ETA/  I should also add that depending on your house, and the location of your woodstove heating your house consistently does take some practice.  I can easily heat my whole house up to 80 degrees, or go the other direction because it wasn't properly burning, filled, and set for an 8 hour night.  Because I have a 35' draft I can easily fill my house with smoke when starting up the stove if not done correctly.

I live in the upper peninsula and have a generator, gasoline, an interlock kit with power inlet set up so my wife can get everything plugged in, running, and run the house if the power is out and I happen to be travelling for work.
Range is propane, cooktop can be lit with a lighter or match, oven requires electricity, heat is propane boiler and also requires electricity.  Hot water electric (luxury, don't care about in the event of a power outage), electric well, electric sump pump.  Deep freezer in garage, refrigerator in house.  We buy food in bulk and rotate through a bunch stored in the basement.

I have lanterns powered by propane, battery, and oil, plus half a dozen AAA headlamps that work great.

The biggest winter prep is the generator, and gasoline.  Followed very closely by maintaining at least half a tank of propane.  This is enough to keep the house warm for two straight weeks without power.

Twice last year we had storms that shut I-75 and US-2, on one of those occasions US-2 had 18 feet of snow drifted in spots.

There have been several good winter vehicle preps threads over the years.  Start with a fuel injected engine made in the last 20 years, a good battery, good tires, full tank of gas, always wear or at least bring appropriate outerwear and clothing, shovel, sand, towstrap, SLOW DOWN, pay attention to the weather forecasts, and go from there.

We heated almost exclusively with wood in my previous house.  Current one is really tight on space, and completely not set up for it.
If you have a spot to put a wood stove, that is the best option.  If not, kerosene or bulk propane storage is the way to go.
J.

Will the propane create CO as a byproduct? Might want to be careful if using it, or any other combustibles in a confined area.

My winter preps are usually more along the lines of water, food (including food for the dog), and light. We could get by without heat if we needed to, but we also have several wood burners.

It will produce CO. A few detectors are already included in the house. Also the buddy heater has a CO shutoff (not sure how well I trust that)

Extra milsurp wool blankets to partition off sections of the house not used/heated. Hang the like curtains. Also cheap space blankets and duct tape to cover windows as an extra layer against heat loss.