Laundry Detergent for Pennies

     As a blogger (I never thought I'd call myself that) I look at other mommy blogs as I call them.  Lately I have seen a lot of posts about frugality and things you can do at home to save money, and making laundry detergent is one of them.  After doing some research, and being inspired by the teeny tiny price tag, I decided that this 3 ingredient green and frugal change will be the first, hopefully of many.
     I used a combination of a few different recipes but mainly from tipnut.  I used a 5 gallon bucket, and wanted to only use 1/2 cup per load, so I tweaked a few recipe's.  Here's what I did.


3 1/4 gallons water
1 bar of soap grated
1 cup washing liquid
1/2 cup borax

     First I heated 4 cups of water in a pot to boiling.  While I waited, I grated the soap, which was much easier than I expected.  

     Next add the soap to the water slowly (I recommend waiting until it's a very low boil or not quite boiling - because when I added the first handful of soap curls they immediately exploded into suds...not my brightest moment).

     Pour 3 gallons of warm water into your 5 gallon bucket, and after the soap is all dissolved add to your warm water stirring for about a minute.

     Add 1 cup washing soda and stir thoroughly before adding 1/2 cup borax, again stir thoroughly.  Cover bucket and let set overnight.

     Use 1/2 cup per load of laundry, optional to use 1 cup if load is extra large or dirty.

     I didn't plan ahead enough, and resorted to saran wrap since I didn't have a lid.  It worked just fine, and I have since gotten a bucket with lid to make my life easier.

     The next morning my detergent looked a little funny, and was very clumpy so I stuck my hand in to break everything up, and it really improved the texture and evenness of the detergent.  I am totally satisfied and highly recommend it!  My next step...someday, is to make my own soap to use.

     Another side note, some recipe's are really specific about the types of soap, but I just bought some and as you can see it was blue and scented and I don't think it made much of a difference.

     I mentioned that this is cheap, but how cheap you ask...well here's what I figure.  $1.99 for 3 bars of soap, $2.40 for Washing Soda, and $2.39 for Borax.  I only used 1/12 of the borax costing only $0.20 per batch.  The washing soda makes 6 batches costing only $0.40 per batch.  Finally I only used one bar of soap costing $0.67 per batch.  All of this totals to $1.27 per batch, and each batch has 3 gallons plus an extra 5 cups or 53 cups total.  Since I just use 1/2 cup per load each batch makes 106 loads ringing in at a total of just over $0.01 per load!  Gotta love saving money!

     Good luck in your trials!