De-Ice Your Steps Tip

How to keep your steps and sidewalks clear this winter without using ice melt!

Winter Snow has arrived in some places and approaches in others.  It is time to prepare ourselves for those icy steps that threaten our safety.  One swift slip on an icy step can brake bones, dislocate joints, pull muscles, and basically do massive damage to our bodies.  So the first thought is to buy a de-icer for our walkways, however we have recently learned that de-icers can be a pollutant to nature and a destroyer of our walking surfaces.   Here is a great NATURAL tip and idea on how to keep your steps and sidewalks clear this winter without using a de-icer or salt…

Purchase a metal two gallon pail and a metal average sized cake pan.   Go to the Sand and Gravel Co., or to a lake shore and fill up the pail with fine sand.  Place pail of sand in the garage with the cake pan over the pail to keep out leaves and cats.  Have a small rug available to be used by the door when needed.  When winter comes, and perhaps a sleet storm, and you find a coating of ice on the walk ways. You are now ready!

1. Turn on the oven to 400 degrees.

2. Put about 1 to 2 cups of sand in the cake pan.

3. Put the cake pan of sand into the oven.

4. Place the old rug by the door to wipe feet on when through.

5. In about 10 minutes shut off the oven, open the outside door, and with hot pads remove cake pan of sand and carefully carry it to the ice.

6. Hold the cake pan near the walkway and shake a fine coating onto the ice.

7. You will now have nearly perfect traction as you walk.

8. It will stay on the surface and works until the ice disappears.

9. Put the material away and be ready for the next icing of the walks.

No Salt! That takes quite a while to be effective, corrodes the metal railings and automobiles, and causes the concrete to crumble and bridges to collapse.

This tip is courtesy of Loren Mosman