Pin 25 of 52

Laundry soap! Oh how fast I go through laundry soap. Even with my laundry schedule of only doing 1 load a day with everyone having their own laundry day and what not I still go through a ton of laundry soap. Granted I do probably use more than I should, but I've really weird about my clothes being clean. Any-who about two years ago I tried making my own laundry soap. I made this liquid that was more of a gel then a liquid and well I just was very skeptical. I didn't like it. At all! I didn't feel that my clothes were getting clean no matter how much detergent I put in there. I didn't like the idea of powder. I always had used liquid, my mom used liquid growing up, it was just what I was used too. So I didn't look into it anymore I just went back to buying my Gain and moved on with life. Fast forward 2 years and I'm into Pinterest and see a pin (here) for homemade powder laundry soap with only 6 ingredients for only about 20 bucks. I liked the idea, pinned it and moved on. I kept seeing it getting pinned and I finally broke down and made a small batch in August to see if I would like it. I loved it! LOVED it. I made about half a batch and it lasted about 3 months. This time I will do a legit break down to see how many loads I get and this and that. Here are the ingredients that I used:)

          1 (4 lb 12 oz) Box of Borax- Found in the detergent aisle 

          1 (3 lb 7 oz) Box of Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda- Found in the detergent aisle

          2 (14.1 oz) Bars of Laundry Soap- Found in the detergent aisle (excuse the fact that I have Ivory     soap. My smart self didn't think about it not being laundry bar soap until after I grated it. I used Fels Naptha)

          1 (2 lb) Box of Arm & Hammer Baking Soda- Found in the cooking aisle

          1 (55 oz) Bottle of Purex Crystals Fabric Softener- Found in the detergent aisle ( This is optional but I love love LOVE this softener and figured if I'm going to throw it in anyways I might as well just mix it in. Also even though I have two pictured here I only used one because I divided the whole thing in half because I don't use softener on our cloth dipes)

          2/3 (2 lb) Container of OxyClean- Found in the detergent aisle. (This is totally optional as well but I definitely recommend using it:)

And here is a breakdown of the price I paid:

Borax - 3.38 

Washing Soda - 2.58

Fels Naptha - .97 each- 1.94

Baking Soda - 1.38

 Purex Softener - 6.59

OxyClean - 7.97 - (since I only used 2/3) 5.32

Total 21.09

Of course the prices of things will vary depending on where you are. But I figure for 22 bucks (rounding up) for at least 6 months, you can't go wrong. Okay, so I probably should have sat and figured this out before hand but what the hay! Okay so if I do 5 loads a week for 6 months that is 120 loads that is still only 17 cents a load. I think I will get more then 6 months and 120 loads out of it and I will be keeping track of it this time so I will get back to you on the actual break down:)

One reason I love this is because it's soooo easy. Like, seriously, all you do is grate the soap (the hardest part) and mix it together . Bada-bing bada-boom & done! I take a couple extra steps to divide it because I don't wash our cloth diapers with softened so half of it doesn't have softener. Then I take 1 more extra step to put it in containers so I'm not having to scoop out of a big container:) Here is the final product:)

I love Purex softener containers because they are easy to handle, they hold quite a bit and they have a measuring lid. The original blog says about 2 tablespoons which equals the middle line of the cap will do it. I usually fill it to the top line and sometimes I'll add in another one that's filled to the first line. (Again, I'm weird about my laundry getting clean). Simple as that.