Fire Starter
No I’m sorry, despite what the title says, this is not a post about rekindling your relationship with your significant other. This post is about how to make fire starters for a campfire.
One of my pet peeves is having my kids standing around the fire pit monitoring my fire starting abilities. After about five minutes of me scrounging, layering and situating I hear the little voices saying, “how come it’s not starting”, “Dad’s always starts the first time”, “You’re not very good at this huh Mom”. Then their dad comes in chuckling, moves a couple sticks around, blows a little at the bottom of the sticks and viola’ we have a heater of a fire! It’s so infuriating!
So I thought it would be good for me to share my new found secret here at Nature For Kids, which I got from my mom-in-law, Linda. A fire starter is something you simply put at the base of your fire and light. It stays lit longer allowing the wood and kindling to catch fire completely.
Here’s how you make them…
You Will Need: Egg carton, utility scissors, birthday candles or wicks, large soup can, *paraffin wax, newspaper, large pot of water
*don’t be intimidated. You usually can get paraffin wax from your local Wal-mart. Any craft store should have it too. It’s useful in making inexpensive emergency candles also.
Begin heating pot of water on the stove on high heat. Take the egg carton and cut into individual pods, as seen in the picture. Set the pods out on newspaper. Have birthday candles or precut 2.5-inch wicks nearby. Place a brick of the wax inside a large soup can. Put the can inside the pot of hot water. (it will work like a double boiler system) Be sure it’s not too hot. You want to melt the wax slowly. Once the wax is melted pour into egg pods, careful not to overflow. Place a birthday candle or wick in center of wax. Let cool.
And there you have it. Just put your newly made fire starter at the base of your fire pit and watch that baby burn. This is a foolproof way to never be the brunt end of your children’s fire jokes!
Here are some other great fire starter options.
Don’t forget about the Nature For Kids logo sticker give away that’s going on. Just send in a picture of your flower child and be entered in the drawing!
outdoors, campfire, camping
3 Responses to “Fire Starter”
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We used to make a variation of these in Girl Scouts before we went camping. I never thought about using egg cartons. Great tip! And so much safer than lighter fluid!
One thing you missed is putting a dab of dryer lint in the eye pod before pouring the melted wax in- it works either way, but it’s a great way to “recycle” the dryer lint and helps start the fire. Love ya
Ahhh! Thanks Linda! Did you catch that everybody. Don’t forget the dryer lint!