It has taken me years to realize how much sunlight has been hitting my house during the late afternoon hours. The entire yard is illuminated and there isn’t much shade. This is in part why I’ve struggled to grow flowers and herbs in this environment. Between the constant direct sunlight and the large amounts of sand in our soil, it has never been a conducive place for gardening. It’s also easy to get a severe sunburn after only 30 to 40 minutes of direct sun exposure to open skin. My kids have that rare condition often called “devil’s itch” where they get excruciating pain during the healing period for a bad sunburn. That’s why I have to be so vigilant with them regarding sunscreen. My wife and I have had the habit of leaving the curtains open in the afternoon hours to let in sunlight, but I was reading on an energy saving blog that this heats up your house a lot faster compared to leaving the curtains shut. The radiant light heats the objects inside your home that are in its path, making things harder for your central air conditioner. After I purchased and installed light blocking curtains, our energy bills dropped significantly. Unfortunately, it makes our house a lot darker during the day. We get around this downside by shutting curtains in windows getting direct sunlight while opening the curtains in windows on the opposite side of the house. This way we still get daylight without getting direct radiant heat from the sun. When you have a family to support, you have to look for every possible way that you can save money without making many changes.
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