Homemade Laundry Soap - easy!!

August 15, 2008 by pamela.

For several months I have been using ‘home-made’ laundry soap and have been very pleased with the results! In addition to the ease of making the soap, the dollar savings has been a great help to me/my family! This may sound terrible, but I’ve never attempted to be very thrifty in the laundry room. As a front-loader user and a Tide–Clorox–Spray’nWash–Oxi-Clean-Downey girl and mom of many, I’ve obviously bought large, washed large and $pent large. Now… after several months of still washing large but not spending large, it’d be pretty tough to go and spend $27. on a box of Tide and $12.00 on a bottle of Downey. Now, I’m spending less than 5 dollars for about 100 loads of wash. I still use hot-hot water & double rinse for white clothes and towels.

I still use the Spray ‘n Wash occasionally and the Oxi Clean, too, on occasion, but for the most part I am using only the home-made soap and Vinegar in the rinse dispenser for rinse aid and softening the fabric. I’m going to try a mix of hydrogen peroxide/lemon juice —or— when I can order some, I’d like to try sodium perborate for whitening the clothes w/o using Clorox bleach.

So, here’s a way of making home made laundry soap. And… by the way, I used Fels Naptha for the first 5 gallon pail, and I used lavender goat-milk soap the last time. I think I prefer the lavender soap and so I ordered lavender bar soap from Azure Standard to use in making my next bucketful of laundry-soap next week. Okay, so I started with these: an empty 5 gallon bucket, water, bar soap, washing soda & borax. I got the soap, washing soda and borax at Fred Meyer (you can find these in most grocery store’s laundry products department).

First, I grated a bar of Fels Naptha soap and covered that grated bar with water in a medium sauce pot - on low - on the stove. I stirred it until it completely melted.

Here’s what the grated soap looks like in the pan — and this is what is then covered with 4-6 cups of hot water and stirred until completely dissolved.

Then I filled my bucket one fourth full of hot-hot water and 2 cups of Borax and 2 Cups of Washing Soda

… and then I whisked and whisked and whisked until the borax and soda were completely dissolved.

…and when then I switched to my large-long handled potato masher and used that to incorporate the liquefied Fels Naptha or other bar of soap. It becomes quite gelatinous and thick after blending. I moved the half full bucket to our laundry area and then I filled it the rest of the way with hot water and continued to blend well.

I then snapped on a Gamma Seal lid - a very cool product - especially if you have arthritis and prying off bucket lids is hard. I have slowly switched all of our former lids to Gamma Seal lids (fits most 3.5-7 gallon buckets). The seems-permanent ‘ring’ is snapped on the bucket and the center of the lid spins off to open and on to tightly close the bucket. I use buckets for grains, cereals, honey, raw sugar, granola… and now, soap!

When my soap is finished, I fill a small 1 gallon rubbermaid bucket that sits on my washing machine. And the rest of the soap remains in the 5 gallon bucket for refills. I use about one HALF cup per load - and less than that on lightly soiled clothes - so, essentially there are 160 portions in a 5 gallon bucket. [I had the math wrong here originally — oops]

My 5-gallon bucket is now empty - ready for the next soap making in a few days. One more note… I add a dropper full of Essential Oil (honeysuckle, orange, lavender mixed in a little bottle) to each load’s rinse water - yep, right into the vinegar in the “fabric softener” dispenser.

And… voilà nice clean, sweet smelling clothes! Happy washing!!

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