Homemade Laundry Detergent

As matriarch to a family of five, I often find myself doing about half a dozen loads of laundry in any given week, sometimes more when I wash bed linens.  Since I have been out of [full-time] work for the past three years, I have tried cutting back on unnecessary expenditures.  Laundry detergent is relatively expensive and I never can find good deals on it.  I purchased it in bulk from Amazon a couple of times but that still wound up being pretty costly.  I decided after doing some researching that I would make my own and it winds up only costing pennies per load.  I've been using my homemade detergent for several months now (on an $11 investment) and I'm happy with it.  My clothes stay clean and I still have a lot of detergent left before I have to make another batch (for $1).  Anyway, here's how I did it...

1.  First, gather all the materials.

• Borax
• Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda
• Fels-Naptha Soap Bar
• 5 gallon bucket with lid
• Empty containers (enough to fill ten gallons)

I found the first three ingredients at Wal-Mart, all neatly merchandised together by the dryer sheets.  Apparently, I'm not the only person who makes her own laundry detergent.  They came to about $7 total.  The bucket and lid came from Home Depot for about $4.  I had saved up containers for awhile knowing that I would be needing them soon.  I still didn't have enough so I wound up over concentrating my detergent into fewer containers and I still had to leave some in the bucket and refill the containers when I had used the contents.  Everything is reusable except the Fels-Naptha bar.  That is the only thing that has to be repurchased for the next load.  The Borax and Super Washing Soda go a long way, and of course the containers and bucket last indefinitely.

2.  Next, use a cheese grater to grate the entire soap bar.  (I'll be frank here, it was too hard for my delicate fingers to grate so I had my husband do it for me.)

3.  Put the shredded soap into a pot and add four cups of hot water, place it over medium heat, and stir until it has completely melted.

4.   Fill the 5 gallon bucket halfway with hot water.

5.  Add the melted soap mixture. 

6. Then add 1 cup of Super Washing Soda and 1/2 cup of Borax.

7.  Stir with something that is long enough to reach the bottom of the bucket, like a wooden paint stirrer or if you have one that attaches to a drill, that is ideal for this application.

8.  Continue stirring while filling the bucket the remainder of the way with hot water.

9.  Place the lid on the bucket and allow the mixture to sit for a full 24 hours.

When it is ready, it will have gelled slightly.  Stir again.

10.  Finally, funnel the detergent into the bottles.  Simply fill the bottles halfway and fill the remainder with water.  Shake well.  Also shake before each use.

These are some of the jars I filled.  I still had just under half of my bucket left when I ran out of containers.  I came up with some more containers and refilled some of these before I finally ran out.  This batch will last me about six months, maybe a little longer, as I do A LOT of laundry and I over concentrated the detergent in the containers.  I use this detergent in a GE front-loading HE machine and have not had any problems.  About 1/4 cup will wash a regular load of clothes.  In a regular machine, probably 1/2 cup.  You can add essential oil drops for fragrance but I found the detergent to have a nice clean smell.  The clothes don't come out with much of a smell, but they are plenty clean.  I use this detergent with a homemade fabric softener and then a regular Bounce sheet in the dryer.

Here's where the magic happens...

** I have also used this detergent on my son's cloth diapers without any ill effects.