Making Laundry Detergent

I ran across a post about making laundry detergent on Donna's blog. I ended up reading several posts on different blogs about making laundry detergent and I decided to give it a try. I was very pleased with the result.

You'll see the ingredients needed in the photo: Borax, Fels Naptha Laundry Soap, Arm and Hammer Laundry Soap, plus Baking Soda. Arm and Hammer Laundry Soap may be the one that is not easy to find from what I read on other blogs. They don't have it at Wal Mart. However, I was lucky enough to find all three ingredients at our Kroger store. Some recipes made more detergent than I wanted to try out.

I used one bar of Fels Naptha. You have to grate it up in a food processor or on a hand grater, which is what I used. It grates very easily. You have around two cups when you finish, maybe a little more.
I put the grated soap into a container that I'd had stored for years. Now I'm glad I didn't get rid of it. I added two cups of the Borax and 2 cups of the A/H Laundry Soap, plus a half-cup of baking soda. All you do is stir it up and it'll look like this:

You use a tablespoon for a load of laundry. I used two tablespoons per full load. One tablespoon for small loads. The bloggers who had figured out the cost said the cost was 3 cents a load, which is a great buy. Plus after using the above amounts of the ingredients, I still have enough to make two more batches. All I'll have to buy is the soap, which is $1.27 a bar.

I liked using it. I didn't see any difference in this detergent and the store-bought that I use. I do use Tide Total Care on many of my good clothes and I'll continue to do that, but, for me, the homemade detergent did a great job on towels and sheets. It doesn't sud, so it would be great for front-loading machines. Also it has a fresh light scent of soap and it doesn't leave any chemical fragrance behind, which I loved.

Also a tip for softening, use vinegar in your rinse. It will soften fabrics. If you
want to boost the softening, you can cut your dryer sheets in half and use a half instead of a whole one.

Besides laundry I've been busy with work and spring cleaning around the house. I've also been taking some photos and I'm going to post a few of my favorites that I took this week at work of some cuties and a litter of lab puppies.