Making Kindling With A Kindling Cracker

Today was finally a lovely day.  We have had day after day of cloudy weather, but we saw the sun today.  The temperatures were pretty mild depending on who you asked.  We saw people in shorts and short sleeved shirts, and we saw people in parkas with their hoods up.  The people in the heavy jackets probably returned from a winter in the south and weren't prepared for a temperature under 70 degrees.  Soon it will be warm enough to have our first fire in the fire pit.  In preparation for our camp fire season, my husband made some kindling to start the fires.  For Christmas this year he got an awesome gift called a Kindling Cracker.  No it isn't something to eat, it's a way to easily turn a firewood log into pieces of kindling.  This device was invented by a school aged student from New Zealand.  He made it for a science fair project, and someone decided to market it.  It is a solid piece of cast iron with no moving parts so it's safe and easy to use.

You just place a piece of firewood inside the safety ring and strike it with a blunt instrument, such as a hammer, mallet or even another piece of wood. This forces the wood down onto the splitting wedge.

This Kindling Cracker eliminates the need to swing a sharp axe which can be dangerous and hard to do.  The axe requires good aim and some strength.  The cracker doesn't require as much force.

Hit the log with a mallet.

It splits the log in half.  If you want smaller pieces just split it again.

We now have a pile of kindling.  Hopefully we can have a camp fire soon.  The weather report looks like a wintery mix in a couple of days.  Maybe we will have to have a fire in the fireplace until this nice weather is here to stay.