Right now, I am doing my first load of laundry with my homemade laundry soap! I got really fed up with having to pay so much for laundry detergent, and ever since my oceanography class back in 2007 I've felt really guilty using any household product that contains phosphates.
I don't want to preach about the dangerous environmental effects of using phosphates, so if you are at all interested I suggest these links:
Its really easy to make your own laundry soap, but I have to admit that this soap is not perfect... the soap I ground up into my detergent contains both lard (not vegan) and optical whiteners (chemicals with questionable effects on fish). I didn't realize that these ingredients were in (lard = sodium tallowate) the bar soap I used until after I had made it. Baby steps... the next batch will hopefully be better!!!
I followed these online directions on how to make powdered laundry soap. Borax, washing soda, and a grated up bar of soap. Unlike the online directions, I used Zote bar soap instead of Fels Naptha. I haven't been able to find Fels Naptha in the grocery stores I usually shop at. I also had a hard time finding washing soda, so I called church and dwight (the arm and hammer company) and ordered some over the phone. They shipped it to my house for free! Pretty awesome considering I ordered about 8lbs of washing soda.
I really can't emphasize enough how inexpensive it is to make laundry soap. I spent about $3 on about 4lbs of borax, and $9 on approximately 8lbs of washing soda. Considering I only need 1 cup of each of these ingredients to make a batch of laundry soap and each load only requires the use of about 2tbsp of detergent... THATS CHEAP!!
Another cheap laundry tip... put your fabric softener in a spray bottle and put about 2 spritzes in your drier before you load in your laundry. This trick makes your fabric softener last longer!
No comments:
Post a Comment