Frugal Green Living: Easy to Make Fire Starters from Recycled Materials

Looking for a frugal and eco-friendly way to start your camp fire or wood stove? Try one of these ideas-you'll be surprised how simple they are:

Pinecone Starters

Materials Needed:

Pinecones

Little bits of used/old candles

Instructions:

Forage your property for pinecones and your cabinets for candles that are too small for use.

Tip: If you're planning on this project, start saving your wax candle drippings along with little bits of left-over candles in a container.

Using a double boiler, small crock pot, or a small saucepan, heat candle wax until liquid. (Whatever method you choose, use a low heat setting and melt wax slowly.)

Use metal tongs to roll pinecones in wax, drip off excess wax and allow pinecone to dry on wax paper or metal pan.

Optional: If you do not have a lot of wax to work with, just coat one side of the pinecone.

Once dry, the pinecone fire starters are ready to use. To transport, wrap in wax paper or store in a plastic container.

Laundry Roll Starters

Materials Needed:

Toilet Paper or Paper Towel Tubes

Lint from Dryer

Scrap Paper (this is a great way to recycle used wrapping paper or newspaper)

Instructions:

Loosely fill (stuff) a toilet paper or paper towel tube with lint.

Wrap tube completely in a piece of scrap paper, leaving at least three inches of paper to overlap each end of tube. Twist paper at ends of tube (tube should now resemble a piece of wrapped candy.)

Optional: If you have string or ribbon to recycle, tie off the ends of the tube.

Store tubes in an open metal or plastic container away from heat sources until ready to use.

Egg Carton Starters

Materials Needed:

Cardboard Egg Cartons

Small woodchips (or sawdust, or dryer lint)

Wax (as in the pinecone project, a great way to recycle old candles or candle wax drippings!)

Instructions:

Cut out individual egg cups from carton. Shred remainder of carton into small pieces.

Place egg cups on wax paper or metal pan.

Fill each egg cup with a mixture of shredded carton pieces and small woodchips (or sawdust/dryer lint.)

Heat up candle wax using a double boiler, small crock pot, or small sauce pan until wax is liquid. (Whatever method you choose, use a low heat setting and melt wax slowly.)

Drizzle wax over material in center of egg cups. Some melting/condensing of material will occur.

Allow to dry. Store in an airtight container until ready for use. When ready for use, use one to three egg cups (depending upon fire size.)

Quick Starters

In a pinch and don't have time to create one of the above options? Trying using one of these on-hand items

- Birthday Candles

- Cheetos Cheese Puffs (seriously!)

- Cotton Balls

- Dried Pine Needles

These won't work as well as a long term solution, but they work better than using matches or lighters alone.

Looking for more green living home-made ideas? Check out:

Green Living: Cleaning the Eco-Friendly Way with Homemade Products