Some people have way too much time on their hands

A few years ago, I remember reading about folks who make their own reusable toilet paper. Personally, I believe that the invention of toilet paper in the mid-19th century was one of the great breakthroughs of all time, replacing as it did leaves, moss, corncobs, newspapers, pages out of the Sears Roebuck catalog, et al. items that might work in an outhouse, but wouldn't quite work once toilets went inhouse. (Imagine flushing a corncob? Not to mention, where would urban dwellers get access to anything other than a newspaper or catalog? Honey, would you mind stopping on the way home for some leaves and moss? We're running low.)

Anyway, I had just one word for the toilet-paper bloggers out there debating what type of flannel to use to make "family cloth," the nifty euphemism for reusable t.p. And that word was CRAZY!

Seriously, it's not as if washing toilet paper doesn't use up energy. It's not like laundry detergent isn't a pollutant. (Maybe the toilet paper bloggers use rocks in a river.) And then there's the obvious yuck factors involved. As an older child, I changed plenty of cloth diapers, and it was disgusting to slosh a poopie diaper around in the toilet to remove the "soil." Whirling a dirty disposable diaper away in a Diaper Genie, despite the landfill aspects, is just a lot more convenient. Out of sight/out of nose/out of mind.

Then, back in olden times, there was the ammonia smells emanating from the enameled diaper pail in the bathroom. My mother did several loads of wash every day (except Sunday, by tradition a day of rest for our washing machine and clothesline), so dirty diapers didn't mount up. And still the diaper pail smelled...

So no thanks to reusable toilet paper.

But I suspect that those with enough time on their hands to handcraft toilet paper could also be reusing their dryer lint.

According to The Spruce,  there are loads of things you can use that dryer lint for. 

The first hint: keep a resealable storage bag near your dryer and use it to collect the lint you're religiously removing from the lint trap each time you do a dryer load. (I am actually quite religious about this.) Seal the bag tightly, as you want "to keep the lint fresh and soft." Because who likes stale lint?

Once you bag a bag-full, why not make some fire starters. After all, what better use to make of something (i.e., dryer lint) that's highly flammable. You may not be able to do this if you use cloth t.p. - and, if you use cloth t.p., you're probably not using paper towels, either - as you won't have t.p. or paper cardboard towel tubing to shove the lint into. But it you do, shove away and then wrap your fire startersin wax paper and, as if you're rolling a joint (which I'd no doubt be doing if I were making my own dryer lint fire starters), twist the ends. Voila! A fire starter. Or you could tear a cardboard egg carton apart and use the cups. Once filled with lint, seal the deal with melted candle wax. (Just don't use a Styrofoam carton.)

If you're making small crafts that call for stuffing, or even for larger items like throw pillows and comforters, lint will do you. Not a good idea if the item is ever going to be washed, however. The lint will just wad up on you. And I'm thinking that something highly flamable might not be a good thing to use to stuff a child's toy. When I was a kid, I believe that most stuffed toys were stuffed with (highly flammable) sawdust. Too bad women no longer wear nylon stockings, as I've got a tip from my mother: when the sawdust starts seeping out of that teddy bear, or, in my case, my little dog Sniffy, replace it with cut up nylons. (Sniffy recently observed his 71st birthday, and most of his life has been spent stuffed with nylons from the pre-pantyhose era.)

Gardeners can toss dryer lint in their compost pile and use it to "prevent soil erosion and weed growth." Not a great mulch, but if erosion or weeds are your problem, well, there you go. Indoor gardeners can use lint to line plant pots. 

What else? Dryer lint is "a good option" for packing. Or to make papier mache. Less craftily, "dryer lint is great at absorbing spills, especially those from oil." Good to know! (NOT!)

I'm all for sustainability, for protecting the environment, but reusing dryer lint? What's next? How to use dried boogers?

Some poeple have way too much time on their hands.

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And a tip of a papier mache chapeau, crafted from dryer lint, to my sister Kath for pointing this WTF story my way.