Make Modeling Dough from Dryer Lint: A Tutorial
As much as I love many things about autumn, moving my clothes drying indoors is not one of the things I love. My clothes dryer holds fewer clothes than my clothesline does, it takes longer to dry them than a really sunny day does, it doesn’t leave my clothes smelling all nice and fresh and outdoorsy like the actual outdoors does, and it costs me money! And dryer lint? That just pisses me off.
My kiddos, however, love themselves some dryer lint. It’s the older one’s special job to help me by emptying the lint catcher in the dryer, and when she fills her little pail full, we make dryer lint modeling dough. Here’s how:
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You will need: three cups of dryer lint, two cups of water, two cups of cheap-o flour, one teaspoon of cream of tartar, and any extras you want to fold in (see below)
1. Stir together in a pot, while gently heating, the dryer lint, water, flour, and cream of tartar.
2. Stir and stir and stir and stir. The mixture will gradually start to come together and look less like lumps of dryer lint and flour swimming in a soup of water and more like play dough.
3. When the mixture begins to have a dough-y consistency, fold in any extras that you’d like: one or two drops of essential oil (I used eucalyptus this morning when I was feeling stuffy), any amount of large-grained salt (some kids like the extra texture), food coloring (it will bump up the color of your lint dough, but won’t change it drastically), or glitter (because even lint dough likes to be pretty).
4. Dump your lint dough out on a countertop and let it cool.
5. When it’s just warm to the touch, knead it around in your hands for a bit. If the dough is too sticky, gradually knead in more flour; if it’s crumbly, gradually knead in more water.
6. Hand it off to the kiddos, and make yourselves some dough people.
This is a handy little art material, but it generally won’t keep well past a day or two, and let’s face it–it’s no capital P, capital Doh, and it’s a little redneck to be the kind of DIY kit that you put together all pretty under the Christmas tree. But hey, it’s dryer lint–what else were you going to do with that stuff?
THIS is wonderful - tu for sharing!
This is a great post! I always wondered if dryer lint could be recycled in a creative way. Very cool!
Dryer lint can be placed outdoors near the compost and birds will find it to line their nests with!
My friend said it is possible to make paper out of dryer lint too, maybe that would make a cool post too
Thanks! Cool recipes here: http://www.planetpals.com/dryer_lint_crafts.html
and here:
http://www.ehow.com/how_4423713_make-multicolor-paper-out-lint.html?ref=fuel&utm_source=yahoo&utm_medium=ssp&utm_campaign=yssp_art
[...] find pretty simple directions for making modeling dough (generic Play-Doh) out of dryer [...]
[...] at Eco Child’s Play you can find pretty simple directions for making modeling dough (generic Play-Doh) out of dryer lint, flour, water and cream of tartar. You can add in essential [...]
Can’t wait to try this. Disposing of dryer lint is my son’s fave thing to help with these days. He always asks for more! I’ve just moved to a city in Canada where almost nothing is “garbage” but I kept meaning to check if dryer lint went in the compost.
The best part about making stuff like that, for me, is finding a second use for something that is definitively trash. After my partner’s next big home improvement project, I’ll post a recipe for making modeling dough out of sawdust.
I find dryer lint makes a good fire starter material for camp fires, using flint and steel sparks into a lint patch starts up better than matches. I keep the whole thing in a plastic bag, lint flint, steel in my glove box, ya never know!
Cool! Other option is live like Europeans and give up the dryers! It is amazing how families in Europe manage just fine, even all winter long without any dryers.
It took us Americans a little while to adapt when we first started our family open ended trip around the world, but find we love it now. Wonder how much money/energy could be saved if Americans gave up their dryers completely?
My mom managed just fine with 4 kids and no dryer in Michigan winters during the 50’s too. Kids clothes last so much longer too, so you can sell them for higher prices on ebay or 2nd hand shops since dryers ruin clothes quickly.