The House That Never Slumbers is in the country, so bonfires are a big part of our evenings when the weather is decent. I’ve come across a lot of different fire starter products in the camping sections of various stores. Some of them are quite pricey. I’m kind of surprised people actually pay for something to start a fire when you can usually just use old paper or some cardboard. I’ve never actually purchased any products designed specifically to start a fire because I’m way too frugal for that, so I don’t know how well any of those perform when used, but I often make my own, and they work really well and don’t cost a dime.
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The only supplies needed for this simple project are empty toilet paper tubes and dryer lint. With seven people living in The House That Never Slumbers, empty toilet paper tubes and dryer lint are both resources we have in virtually unlimited supply. If you happen to be someone with hoarding tendencies like me, knowing you can put these otherwise worthless items to good use is probably just what you need to have you stashing away trash bags full of dryer lint in your basement. (Don’t actually do that. It’s definitely a fire hazard to hoard full bags of that lint!)
Putting this fire starter together is basically self-explanatory. Stuff a clump of dryer lint into the toilet paper tube, and close the ends up the same way you close a coin wrapper.
I managed to have enough dryer lint and toilet paper tubes to make these in just a couple of days. Though this blog will eventually include affiliate links, ads, and sponsored posts, I promise no one from the dryer lint people nor anyone from the toilet paper companies is paying me to promote these splendid, free materials.
We also use these to start the fire in our woodstove during the winter. The cardboard lights fairly easily, and when it catches the dryer lint, you get a nice flame that will catch your other dry materials on fire.
This is a lovely fire Mrs. Merica build in the fire pit a few nights ago – perfect for a summer night.
I would love to own a fire pit like the one below for the deck, but I would be afraid of what the kids would do with it considering the size of the fires they like to make! We should probably never let them build a fire that close to the house.