Candle Wax Fire Starters

Since it is the season for fireplaces, I thought I would share a recipe for fire starters that I have been using. For the life of me, I cannot remember where I got the original 'recipe' from. I would never claim someone else's work as my own but I am going to share it with you and give credit to whomever posted this on her blog and gave me a wonderful idea. We used to buy starter logs but, at $20 for 6 logs, it just got to be too expensive. Then my husband would hold one of those long lighters to lightard wood and get it going that way but it got to be expensive buying new lighters all the time so this idea came along and I thought "What the heck?". I had everything on hand so I made a dozen of them and boy, do they work GOOD! Hubby was so impressed with them. All you do is light one, stick it under the wood and watch your flames come to life.

You'll need 3 simple household items:

Old candles or broken crayons (with paper removed)
Paper egg carton (do NOT use styrofoam)
Dryer Lint

Take your egg carton and cut off the lid. Then put a small amount of dryer lint in each hole.

Set on a piece of wax paper (I forgot to do this and wound up with wax all over my counter). Then
take a small pot and fill about 1/2 way with water. Set it on the stove to heat. Once water is hot (mine was boiling) put a heavy glass jar (I used one that had come with a candle in it) and stick all the candles/crayons in the pot and let the water melt the wax.

This time I was using a good sized pillar candle so it took at least 30 minutes to melt down. Stir every once in awhile to break the wax down. Once wax is all melted, CAREFULLY take the jar out of the pot. The first time I used my jar lifter from my canner but this time I used 2 oven mitts. This way seemed to work much better and I had more control over the jar. Pour the melted wax over the lint but don't over fill or it will run all over the place (don't ask).

Let them sit on the counter to harden. Once they are hard, cut them apart like so.

Keep them near the fireplace and when you want a nice fire, just light the corner and stick them under your wood.

*NOTE*
How many you get will depend on how much wax you use. This pillar candle was almost new (yikes!) and it made enough for 36 lil' starters.