Homemade Laundry Detergent...

After the response I got from my post about Homemade Cleaners I promised to do a post about homemade laundry detergent. I made my first batch of it and have to say it was super easy and so far I am loving the results! I made a liquid version but there are recipes out there for powdered detergent as well. I choose to do the liquid version because we have a front loading washer and I wash almost everything on cold and powder has a hard time completely dissolving in my machine in cold water.


The first step was getting all of the necessary ingredients/supplies together. A box of borax which I was able to find almost everywhere in the laundry section (Target, King Soopers, Wal-Mart). A box of washing soda, which is soda ash and is not the same as baking soda, though it is distributed by Arm & Hammer, which I was only able to find at King Soopers. It was on the top shelf. A bar of soap - I chose to use Dr. Bronner's Peppermint soap because I got a killer deal on it and I LOVE castile soap. 5 gallon bucket with lid - I found one a Lowe's but I know these are pretty readily available.

Once you have everything the first step to actually making this is to heat 4-6 cups of water in a pan on the stove. You don't want to bring it to a boil, but need it warm enough to dissolve the soap you will be adding to it. While the water is heating up, you need to finely grate the bar of soap. This was the most dangerous and time consuming part of the whole process! Bars of soap are much harder to grate than cheese - yep I know you are shocked to hear that. After several cut knuckles and about 10 minutes of grating on my cheap grater - I had completed this part.


Add the grated soap to the pan and stir frequently until soap dissolves completely.


Next, add hot water to your bucket until it is about half way full and add the soap mixture to it. You will then want to add 1 cup of Washing Soda and 1/2 c. of Borax to it and mix well until you think everything is dissolved. I used a spatula for this so that I could scrape the bottom of the bucket to mix it really well.


Now top the bucket off with hot water until almost full. I covered mine with the lid but didn't seal it completely so that it could "breathe" and then let it sit overnight.

(I took this picture after I had already poured the detergent into the dispenser below and that is why it isn't filled to the top!)

After it has sat overnight the mixture should have gelled/firmed up a bit. Because I used castile soap, my detergent didn't come out a uniform consistency - I like to call it "egg drop soup-like". It definitely firmed up but as you can see in the picture above, it is not the same consistency throughout.


I then used a big funnel to put it into an old laundry detergent dispenser so I don't have to keep a 5 gallon bucket in the laundry room. I store the bucket in the basement away from kiddos and dogs.

I have been using this detergent for a couple of weeks and put it to good test as to how good of a job it does actually cleaning our clothes. The first big test was my daughter's t-shirt that was covered in spilled chocolate milk. It took 2 washes with no pretreatment of the stain but the shirt is completely clean!

I was a little bit hesitant to do this because my son has super sensitive skin but we haven't had any problems with it causing him any issues.

Here's the cost breakdown for those of you interested. I'm going to list whole costs since it was my first batch and I had to get everything and then I'll break it down as to how much it costs to only make the batch (meaning I won't include bucket cost or entire box cost, just cost for how much of each ingredient I used).

Bucket - $3.62
Borax - $3.20
Washing Soda - $4.32
Dr. Bronner's Soap - $1.04 - on super clearance!
Total start up cost = $12.18

Cost of actual ingredients used to make one batch of detergent:
Borax - $.14
Washing Soda - $.71
Dr. Bronner's Soap - $1.04
Water - $.10 (just a high estimate for the 4 1/2 gallons I used)
Total Cost = $1.99 for 4 1/2 gallons of detergent (I estimate this much since I didn't fill the bucket completely to the top)

I use about 1/2 cup (4 oz.) per load and since I made 4 1/2 gallons (576 oz.) I will get about 144 loads per batch at a cost of ONLY $.014 per load, less than $.02 each! How is that for thrifty?

And now a couple of side notes. This whole process from start to finish took me 22 minutes and that includes taking the pictures along the way, so it is a quick process. If you are a better soap grater than I am, you should be able to do this easily in 15 minutes or less. I know people use regular bar soap like Ivory for making their detergent and have success with it as well. Be careful and make sure to store the ingredients out of reach of little ones or pets - these ingredients are natural but can be dangerous for kids and pets if ingested.

Whew...that ended up being a novel! Are you inspired to make your own detergent now? It is just another way to save even more money on things we need and use!