Homemade Natural Laundry Detergent
I am a sucker for saving money. My goal is almost always to get more out of something or to completely finish off a product so that I get my monies worth so that I don't contribute to a consumerist lifestyle. You can almost always find me crunching numbers or trying new tricks to not have to buy something (hello Sephora free samples!). Naturally, when I realized we were almost out of laundry detergent at my house, I decided to research a homemade laundry detergent that got the job done and was also cost effective fitting my frugal lifestyle.
I also knew that in my own laundry detergent, I did NOT want to use Borax. When I was younger, Borax was always used to make science experiments and slime, so I didn't feel great having this "washing" my clothing!
The recipe I landed on is a totally clean, natural and effective detergent that breaks down to about $0.09 a load! That is one-third of the cost of the current detergent we are using - a whopping $0.30 a load!
If you choose to try out this detergent recipe, you can order everything off Amazon, however, I did my own research and found that I could gather my ingredients needed at a few different stores at cheaper costs. I was already going to those stores anyway this week, so it made no big strain on my time! Anyone who hates tedious shopping or doesn't want to run around to different stores is probably best off filling up their Amazon cart! For the record, I got the baking soda at Aldi, Oxiclean Free and my glass storage jar at Target (both $6.50!), and the washing soda and soap bars on Amazon.
When I made this recipe, I quickly realized I didn't need NEARLY as much as it made (we only have two people in my household), and my container for the laundry closet was only 1 gallon, so I halved the ingredients for a smaller batch I could easily store. If you truly need 13 lbs of detergent or have lots of storage space for all of this, by all means, double the recipe to fit your needs.
The Recipie
Recipe
- 1/2 box Arm and Hammer Super Washing Soda (about 27.5 oz or JUST EYEBALL IT)
- 2 lbs baking soda (two of those standard boxes in grocery stores on the baking aisle)
- 2 bars Kirk Castile Soap (4 oz bars)
- 1/2 container Oxiclean Free (about 24 oz or EYEBALL IT!) *The two active ingredients are sodium percarbonate and sodium carbonate in case you were wondering!
Grate those soap bars! Because I didn't want to spend my time using a cheese grater, I ended up throwing a soap bar in my blender with some baking soda to ease the impact. I popped one bar in with half a box of baking soda, then popped in the second bar with the rest of the soda.
mix all measured ingredients in a large bowl or container until it is all evenly mixed. Try not to breath in the powder!
Donezo! That's it!
This yields 5 and some change lbs of detergent. I suggest getting yourself a nice container to store the powder in and a small scoop or spoon for measuring. Use one loaded tablespoon of detergent per load.
Depending on where you get your ingredients, total break down cost may vary depending on pricing of the ingredients.
For me, I got ingredients to make 4 half batches or 22 lbs of this stuff! That ended up breaking down to $0.09 a load for me! 704 loads of laundry from the ingredients bought!
$63.36 total for 704 loads
VS.
my old detergent pricing of $211.20 for 704 loads!
I am definitely a fan of my detergent! It cleans well, is natural, cost-effective and doesn't have anything nasty or that I cannot pronounce in its ingredients! It was super easy to make and took me less than 20 minutes to whip up thanks to my blender trick!
