I've actually sat my crockpot outside on the weekends so it doesn't heat up the kitchen either....set it on a TV tray so the critters don't check it out. If I want really tender meat for shredding, I cook it all night and then put it in frig the next morning so I can shred it whenever I want.
If you squeeze and iron your fabric down tightly, I've received fat eights in the regular size envelopes...regular business size ones work great too. The self stick saran wrap works wonders to help keep it squished tight. Again, I'm so lazy, I use the bigger envelopes so I don't have to work so hard to get them squished.