Hello...Camping Season

 

We are hearing the rumble from within and without,

"When we go camping this summer..."

That time has hit in some parts of the west;  it's time to break out

the tent, trailer, motorhome, or whatever,

and take up residence for a few days in the relative "wild."

 

One necessity with camping is a camp fire.

Somehow we always manage to get the kindling, wood, and lighter

to camp but manage to forget newspaper or other trash paper to get the fire started.

 

Voila! 

 Enter the cheap and easy home made Fire Starter that can be stored

 with your camping supplies so that it always shows up to camp.

 

Start with a cardboard or molded pulp egg carton or crate

(never use plastic or polystyrene).

 

Keep this carton in your laundry room and fill up the cells with dryer lint.

Pack it in and fill each cell 'til it can hold no more.

Don't worry if there is hair, bits of paper, or other unidentified objects in your lint;

the more the merrier.

(It's kind of scary how much dryer lint we can produce in a week!)

 

When the carton is full,

 tear off the top lid.

Place the carton on a protected surface.

 

Then find a child that is wandering by and press them into service

having them tear the lid into little bits.

Put these bits on top of the lint and press them down.

 

 

 

The cells should be overflowing.

 

Melt some wax.

Method #1 (the least preferred-- believe me, I know!):

light a taper candle and drip the melting wax over the cells until they are

well covered and the wax has seeped through to the lint.

Method #2 (the speedy way):  put some old candles in a cheap pan from a

yard sale and melt them on the stove.

(Judging from the age and color of these tapers,

 they are left over from our wedding 24 years ago.)

 

Pour the melted wax over the cells making sure each is well saturated.

 

This is what it should look like when you are finished:

 

When the wax has cooled and hardened, this is what the container will look like:

Granted, it's not very appealing but the picture makes it look worse than it really is.

 

When you are ready to start a fire:

 tear off two or three cells,

place them on your kindling in the fire pit,

light them on fire.

 

No more scrounging around for newspaper or other trash hanging out in our vehicle

every.single.time we want to make a fire.

These are so cheap and easy to make that we have a few ready to go,

some for camping and some for the fire pit at home.

 

In one small way we are ready for camping fun.

Now we just need to find the time to go!

 

++++++++++++++++++

 

We had many days of strong winds so of course everyone's allergies

were acting up.  One day Tiana woke up and had a throat constantly full of phlegm.

She kept telling me that her throat was, "indigested" instead of congested.