• Enter your email address to subscribe to this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

    Join 78 other subscribers

  • “Writing, to me, is simply thinking through my fingers” — Isaac Asimov

  • Recent Posts

  • Pages

  • Categories

  • Archives

  • Blog Stats

    • 195,068 hits

Homemade Laundry Detergent Review

Posted on May 15, 2011 by auburnchick

You might remember that a few days ago, I made my own, homemade laundry detergent using the Duggar’s recipe found here.  I also made my own, homemade fabric softener with the recipe I found here.

I promised to report back after I had tried them out, so that’s what this post is about!

Let me first tell you that I am dumb sometimes.  If you’re a family member, there’s no need to comment with “Amen” to this statement.

The whole time I was reading the instructions for the detergent, I kept thinking, “Why are they saying that this makes ten gallons when you’re only supposed to put everything in a five-gallon container?”

Well…duh.

I figured it out…after the fact.

First, let me back up a bit.

When last I left you, I had mixed the detergent and left it to cool off overnight.

What happens when you do this is that the mixture turns into a gel.

When I washed my clothes, I used 1/2 cup of the gel…BEFORE reading that you’re supposed to put the gel mixture in some sort of container…halfway…and then fill up the rest of the container with water.

Hence, you double the amount of the detergent, making ten gallons out of five.

Ding, ding, ding!

Hence my stupidity.

Regardless, the full-strength detergent did not harm my laundry at all.  The Hawaiian-smelling essential oil made my laundry room smell like a tropical island.

Ahhh…

I had also used some of the oil in my fabric softener, so it was smelling really good when the laundry finished washing.

After my clothes dried, I pulled them off the lines and folded them.  I did notice that the washcloths and tshirts weren’t as crispy, as promised by someone who had reviewed the fabric softener.  They also did not smell like vinegar…a primary ingredient of the softener.

I am going to keep using these recipes…that’s how happy I am with them.

This morning after church, I took an old, empty container of store-bought detergent, washed it out, and filled it halfway with the gel I’d made.  I topped off the bottle with water and wrote the following instructions on it:

I am pleased beyond compare.  This is a very frugal, eco-friendly way to do laundry.

Filed under: Saving Money | Tagged: , , | 2 Comments »

It’s Time for a Little Experiment

Posted on May 12, 2011 by auburnchick

This morning as I put a load of sheets in the washing machine, I discovered that I was just about out of laundry detergent.

Because of the extreme couponing I’d done over the last two years, this was the first time I had been out of the stuff in a very long time.

Of course, I have had absolutely no time to print, collect, or file coupons, so I am very out of the loop and, hence, out of detergent.

For a while now, I’ve pondered the idea of making my own detergent.  I’ve read about it on blogs, but I could never quite bring myself to do it.  Plus, I had twenty bottles of detergent waiting to be used, so I felt justified in putting off the decision.

Coincidentally, when I called today Christina for our daily chat, she mentioned (quite on her own) that someone had told her about the Duggar recipe for homemade detergent.  I quickly googled and found the link.

Well, then I decided to search for a recipe for fabric softener and found this one (check out the reviews that follow the recipe).

Being the woman of action that I am, I decided to put things off no longer and went straight to Walmart after work…

The first thing I did was grate the soap…

Then, I mixed it with the water and stirred it until it melted…

Next, I poured hot tap water into my “bucket” and added the washing soda and borax…

By the way, both of these items were on the bottom shelf on Walmart’s laundry aisle.  They were a little difficult to find, so if you go out shopping, don’t give up!  The soap that I grated above was on the shelf above these boxes.

I stirred until everything was mixed completely and finished things off by adding more hot tap water.

I put the lid on the container and set it aside to thicken.  Tomorrow, I will add the essential oil I purchased, “Hawaiian something,” and give the stuff a test drive.

After finishing up with the detergent, it was time to work on the fabric softener.

I could not believe how few ingredients it required…

First, I added the baking soda to the distilled white vinegar.  In case you didn’t know, when you mix these together, you get bubbles…lots of them…so you have to pour slowly!!

Then, I added quite a few drops of the essential oil.

That was it!

For the first time in a while, I am looking forward to doing laundry.  I cannot wait to test out these new mixtures.  I’m hoping that I like them as much as the reviewers who wrote so glowingly about them.

These recipes are touted as much for their earth “friendliness” as for their economy.  I spent less than $20 on everything (not counting the plastic containers).  I have enough ingredients to make these recipes several times, and when you consider that you only use 5/8 of a cup of the detergent (the entire recipe made five gallons) and one cup of the fabric softener (the recipe made over a gallon), then this is a very good way to save some moolah.

I will report back on the results of this experiment.

Filed under: Saving Money | Tagged: , , , | 5 Comments »

  • December 2025
    S M T W T F S
     123456
    78910111213
    14151617181920
    21222324252627
    28293031  

  • Currently Reading

  • Books I’ve Read