Lots of Laundry...and Soap!

   I have been making my own laundry soap for about 2 years now. It is incredibly easy and inexpensive. The laundry soap method has been on the blog in the past but my most recent batch is my biggest ever! I'm pretty proud of it. I saved about $200 on a 2 year's supply in just one hour. Here's how it works:

Ingredients:
20 Mule Team Borax powder
Arm & Hammer washing soda
bar soap of choice

* There are 10 variations of the recipe depending on the concentration and consistency you prefer. Find them all here at TipNut.com

My preference is a liquid that turns gel after sitting overnight.
My favorite recipe: 2 cups Borax, 2 cups A&H Washing Soda, 2 bars soap per 5 gallons of water.

Grate the bars of soap into shredded pieces.

I purchased a case of 20 bars of soap at Sam's Club for $7.89. That's $.39/each bar or $.78 per 5 gallon recipe.

I knew I was going to make a 25 gallon recipe so I grated 10 bars of soap at one time and then just measured it out for each 5 gallons.

In a large stock pot, bring 8 cups of water to a boil. Add the shredded soap and continue on a low boil until pieces are completely melted.

 

Meanwhile, fill a 5 gallon bucket with hot water and disolve the powder ingredients. Tip: Crush the clumps in your hand before dumping into water. Once in the water, they don't disolve well on their own and the water is too hot to reach in and mess with it then.

 

 

When the soap on the stove is melted and ready to add to the bucket, dump entire contents of stock pot into the bucket and stir until evenly disolved. Continue to fill the 5 gallon bucket with hot water.

 

If your kitchen looks like this in the middle of the process, don't worry! You're doing it right!

 

I had saved - with the help of my dad - a bunch of heavy duty containers with handles, perfect for laundry soap. I only have two 5 gallon buckets for max holding of 10 gallons so I needed more contatiners! Sunny D jugs make the best reusable jugs because the labels come off really easy and they are very durable. Arizona tea jugs too. Regular milk and water gallon jugs tend to be made of plastic that's too thin and will crack and leak over time. I used a large funnel to pour from the big bucket to the smaller jugs. The end result was a year supply of laundry soap for our house and my parents' house.

The average gallon of detergent costs $9. That would be $225 for the 25 gallons I made for under $20 (case of bar soap, 2 boxes each of washing soda and Borax.) If you're buying laundry soap at the store, you are literally throwing money down the drain!