Thursday, December 6, 2012
The Bandwagon
Alright. I can admit it. I jumped on the bandwagon and made my own laundry detergent.
And you know what? It's not too bad.
I used a basic formula that is featured in several "green your home" type books and I washed two test loads- one general (socks, towels, t shirts) and one dirty (gardening socks, work pants, blue jeans). I used WAY less than the suggested amount (because I feel like a cup of anything is a lot) and I gotta say I don't hate the results.
There are no strong perfumes from the type of detergent I made. I did use Ivory soap which smelled very strong when I first chopped it up, but the clothes are virtually smell free. But they are both good and bad smell free. This was especially surprising with the dirty load since it smelled like sweat and compost going in. I guess all of that baking soda worked.
I also decided early on to make a powdered soap, since I read that the "liquid" actually turns into more of a weird jelly substance and can actually mold if you don't use it fast enough. No thank you. The powder was easy to pour, mix, and contain. The entire process took me maybe five minutes since I was extra careful pouring my powder into my recycled container.
Do I love it yet? No. I kind of miss that clean laundry smell. Maybe I will add another bar of soap, or some essential oils... or maybe I just need to give it time and see if I change my mind.
Here is the super simple recipe I used.
4 parts baking soda- not washing soda (I'm planning to use washing soda in the next batch for a comparison)
3 parts Borax
2 parts Ivory soap grated (but if you just cut it with a knife, it tends to grate itself pretty easily. Also, you can put it into a food processor and achieve the same results as well.)
Mix and use. I used 1/4 cup for the regular load and 1/2 for the dirty stuff.
It obviously made 9 cups worth of detergent (4+3+2=9) so I will be trying it out for a while. Hopefully by then I'll have a full report and a final verdict.
Who else is trying new things with laundry? Anyone else still whipping out the clothes line in this 75* weather? We are! Let's gush!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
Audi makes her own laundry soap too. She loves it! She has been doing it for a while and has made some adjustments to this typical recipe. Instead of Ivory Soap, she uses Fels Naptha soap from Walmart. She uses an old blender now designated solely as her "detergent blender". She has found that the Arm & Hammer brand washing powder works much better than the baking soda. It is just a matter of preference, but she has chosen to go with the liquid. Yes it is slimy, but she hasn't run into any issues with mold yet. But we do a considerable amount of laundry in our house (about 5 loads each week). She said the dry works as well as the liquid so it is just about your preference there. Now, my take on it: To me there is something really satisfying about seeing the sudsy water (I actually agitate the middle thingy with only soap and about 1/4 of the tub with water just to make it suds up before I put the clothes in the washer). This homemade soap doesn't make suds like that, pretty much not at all. But the clothes do come out clean. Still I miss that "clean" smell too. Overall, small sacrifices for the cost. Much much cheaper to make our own laundry detergent. We will stay with the homemade option.
ReplyDelete