How to Make a Free Cat Toy from a Toilet Paper Tube

There are tons of simple toys your cat will love to play with, right in your home. There's no need to pay lots of money for a cat toy your cat will ignore or lose under the couch. This cat toy is free, will recycle something that would normally get thrown in the trash and only takes about five minutes to make. What have you got to lose?

Things You'll Need

Cardboard toilet paper tube
Scissors

Instructions

- 1
  Remove all lingering pieces of toilet paper from the tube. You could make the cat toy while some of the paper was still on the roll, but it would make a horrible mess. Cats love ripping apart toilet paper, but the pieces get everywhere and stick to the carpet, so it's best to get all of them off.
- 2
  Using scissors, make a 1-inch-long cut in the end of the tube. Try and make sure the slit is as close to parallel to the side of the tube as you can make it. If it angles to either side, the following slits will intersect it and the little tabs you end up making will be cut off.
- 3
  Make a parallel, 1-inch-long cut about 1/4 inch from your first cut.
- 4
  Continue cutting slits all the way around the top of the toilet paper tube, until you've gone completely around it. Remember to make them as parallel as possible and try to make them the same depth, about 1 inch.
- 5
  Flip the tube over and repeat, making 1-inch deep cuts all around that side of the tube. The slits you've made in the ends of the tube are now like little tabs.
- 6
  Bend all of the tabs out from the tube on both ends. Bend each tab at a 45-degree angle to the tube so the result looks a bit like a spoked wheel.
- 7
  Toss the new kitty toy out on the floor in front of your cat. This toy works best on a wood floor since it rolls and slides really well, but it works fine on the carpet too. Some cats like to whack the toy around, others like to carry it, but all cats seem to like the way the toy jitters around.