Get Your Wash On!!!!

So if you know me in "real" life you know that I am one of those crazy annoying coupon ladies. I started couponing seriously about 4 years ago when I quit my job to have our little girl. At one time I had a pretty large stockpile which filled my laundry room in my basement. There were times when I had well over 20 containers of laundry detergent. I took a break from couponing this year and at one point actually ran out of laundry detergent... ahhhhhhhh! Can you imagine my horror?  So I did what every logical person would do and searched the Internet for an affordable homemade laundry detergent... 

what that's not what normal people do? 

After some time I found a recipe for a liquid laundry detergent... My mom and I decided to give it a try. We each made 5 gallons. I liked it at first, but quickly realized it wasn't for me. It separated after each use and needed to be stirred before adding it to a load on laundry. It also didn't last very long. Even using only a half a cup per load it was gone before I new it... but for only about $2.50 for the entire batch it is definitely worth the extra effort. 

It recently ran out and I was on the search for a dry laundry soap

 and this is what I ended up using.

1 box of Borax

1 box of Washing Soda

1- 4lb box of Baking Soda

2 bars of Fels- Naptha Soap

1 Large bottle of Purex Crystals (this is used instead of fabric softener)
I also added 1- 3 lb container of OxyClean to help with stains, which is not pictured! 

First you need to grate the cheese soap.... This is the most time consuming part so if your smart you will find some cheap help:) Thanks Sierra!! (my cute niece)

Here comes the tricky part.... are you ready???? Dump EVERYTHING into a bucket... and STIR:) 

Also a bit time consuming and can be a little tricky to get it all mixed up evenly... I recommend recruiting some child labor for this too!! I mean I wash, dry, and fold their laundry... the least they can do is help make the detergent! Am I right?

Since this is a dry powder you are stirring it does create some dust in the air. I recommend doing it in the garage, outside, or in our case with the windows open and the microwave vent on HIGH! 

Next step is to find a cute little jar to store it in. This jar was about $10 at Walmart and is a 2 gallon jug. This holds ALL of the detergent that the list of ingredients above will make and is filled to the tippy tippy top:)  I use about 2 tbsp per load. I do at least 2 loads of laundry per day! I estimate that this one batch of detergent will last me the entire year and only cost about $20:) YAY!!!!!! That's even better then with coupons:) Now all I need is a cute vinyl label for my jar and I'm all set:)

 hint hint...in case anyone wants to send that to me!!! :)