Wool Balls- for the Dryer and Cats

Happy Monday everyone! Today is fun and games day and I have something fun for your kitties and good for your laundry too. Homemade dryer balls which I thought would be fun for kitties too. I found several instructions on Pinterest so I went with this one : http://www.seasonedhomemaker.com/how-to-make-felted-wool-dryer-balls/

001Joanie helped 003

I had to buy wool yarn which is actually hard to find, there was only a small section in the craft store. Luckily, I had a 40 % off coupon because $5.99 was pricey. One skein should make 4 balls, I ended up with 5 on the smallish side.

You just wind some around your fingers and make a small ball, then you thread the end and pull it through the ball ( so it won’t unwind). Place the ball in a knee high and tie it off with floss ( don’t use yarn or it will felt). Then you wash the nylon filled with balls in hot water, then you dry them on the hottest setting. I ended up doing this twice and didn’t get an actual “felted” look, but they did hold up when I used them to dry clothes and for the cats to play with. I had catnip spray that I sprayed the one for the kitties with, you could also “marinate” them in catnip. 010Joanie is guarding the stash and Lucy is testing one

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I don’t like to use dryer sheets because I always seem to get a rash, even with the unscented ones. I also don’t like them around because they can be harmful to a cat if the cat plays with them or even get those oils on their fur and lick it off. These do work really well and are supposed to last for a year.

I also tried something else yesterday that didn’t have such good results. I keep reading how great coconut oil is for shaving so I decided to use it in the shower and shave my legs. Big mistake it did work, but it took a lot of scrubbing to remove the oil from my legs and the tub was very slippery. I don’t recommend it.

 

 

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46 comments

  1. We just tried this week with some wool yarn from a thrift store. They work pretty well. I never thought about letting the cats play with them!

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    1. Oh well, at least the yarn was going to get used. Maybe you need to take more points of her review for that.

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  2. Clever you with the dryer balls!!!! Also thanks for the warning about the coconut oil….I should think that would make for a very slippery tub/shower stall….I’ll settle for using it “after” ………Happy Monday!

    Pam (and Sam)

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    1. Thank you 🙂 It does make your legs very soft, but I worry about getting grease on my clothes. Happy Monday 🙂

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  3. Those dryer balls look good. Balls are my favourite toy to play with but they have to be soft. The crochet ball you sent me is still my favourite.

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    1. Thank you for the link, I will check it out. I would have thought you used fish oil-MOL 🙂

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  4. I’ve got some left-over wool – what a brilliant idea to make cat toys. I love the suggestion to rub catnip on them. However, I will not be trying coconut oil for shaving – thanks for the warning!

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    1. Thank you 🙂 I am pretty lucky there are 4 different chains within 40 minutes of my house. They had lots of rayon blend yarn, but wool was hard to find.

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    1. Your Mom definitely could, she is very talented and could make them better than I did.

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  5. I have a woolen ball that some cat donated to me a year ago. But it would be too small to use in the dryer. I like to play with it though. xox

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    1. If they are wool, have your human make you some. They have to be wool though or they won’t hold together.

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  6. You be so talented Ms. Ellen. We luv our dwyer balls, but they not be wool. Mommy dusn’t have a clue how to make them, and sowry but yous instwuctions went wight over hers head. MOL Sum fings she gets and sum she just dusn’t. Da cwafty fings…she just dusn;t get it. Altho’ she wishges she did, cuz those sound pawsum. And they purrawlly don’t make nearly as much noise as da plastic ones we use. Anyways, have a pawsum day.

    Luv ya’

    Dezi and Lexi

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    1. I didn’t really go into detail on the instructions because I took the idea from someone else’s blog which is why I linked to that. Believe me, if I can do something, you can too 🙂

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  7. I wonder if you could make a stuffed fabric ball as a “core” then thread the wool yard through to attach it and start winding around. It would save quite a bit of yarn, but I don’t know if that would hold together.

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    1. That is a good idea. I saw on Pinterest that someone bought an old wool shirt at Goodwill and cut that up.As long as it is wool , it would hold together. Actually one set of directions said animal fur so I bet if I saved cat fur from their brush it would work too. 🙂

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  8. Excellent read, I just passed this onto a friend who was doing a little research on that. And he actually bought me lunch since I found it for him smile So let me rephrase that: Thanks for lunch!

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