Get your chimney looked at before the first fire.

If nobody's looked at your chimney since you bought the house, you don't really know what's going on up there.

You call Kari, tell her what you're seeing, and she sets up a time for us to come out.
We go up on the roof and run a camera the whole way up the flue, and every flue in the chimney gets inspected the way NFPA 211 says to.
If a flue has more than an eighth of an inch of buildup, it gets swept the same visit, and you get the report with pictures by email.