Laundry Soap -Update

Laundry Soap ALA Anita...
I love this stuff. It's a little cumbersome, but I think it's worth the effort. I have a 5 gallon bucket of a gel like substance. It's somethink akin to The Blob... and smells really good. I kept an old laundry soap container. I filled it halfway up with The Blob, added water and shook. It sounds easy- but required a funnel, a stick and patience. I made quite a mess on the laundry room floor. However, since I never mop it - I figured it was due to be cleaned. Next time I'll put a towel down.

So I think it's doing a great job at cleaning the clothes. Better than the other laundry soaps I've tried.

I've always been frustrated by how quickly clothes mildew in the washer. Try as I might, sometimes my laundry sits in my washer a few hours, or even overnight. I get distracted and forget. It happens alot actually. In a few hours they would smell - and I'd rewash. Then I learned to spray Frebreeze in the dryer with them and that usually helped. But only if it had only been a few hours. Overnight meant they HAD to be rewashed. With this soap, no mildew. Maybe I should experiment and see how long it would take. But we've gone up to 48 hours at this point, and they were fine. Seriously AWESOME!! That alone makes it worth it.

So, the homemade laundry soap is here to stay. I'm thinking it could be fun to experiment with. Maybe I'll give it out as Christmas presents. I really like this stuff! Do you think others would be offended to get laundry soap? Would you be? Does it say "You have dirty clothes, you stink, you need help?" I wouldn't want it to say that...yeah - I guess it does.

Todays Adventure...Homemade Laundry Soap

Yep, I'm off to make homemade laundry soap. I must go to Goodwill first and pick up a soup pot that isn't cast-iron. I love my cast-iron to much to boil soap in it. Then I need to find a 5 gallon bucket with a lid, so probably a trip to Lowes or Home Depot. All of this to save money, hopefully it works. And I like the idea of being able to control what goes in it, without trying to decipher the label.


The other benefit... I can make it smell like jasmine. There is no jasmine smelling laundry soap, and I love jasmine. So, I'm off to try and make jasmine smelling homemade laundry soap. I'll let you all know how it goes. . . and if it's worth the effort. Although I'm thinking 6 months of laundry soap for $5 that smells like jasmine just might be worth quite alot of effort.

**UPDATE: Trip to Goodwill -successful. Found pot, found $5 supercute boots, and a stack of kids plates for $1. Kids were good, and hardly stressful. Trip to Home Depot - successful. Found bucket with lid, kids enjoyed car shopping cart and ride through parking lot.

Melted soap (as much as possible) in 'new' pan, and now my house smells like I've just spent 5 hours cleaning. But I haven't. I don't think I ever have. My house has never smelled this clean. I'll just boil some soap before company comes, and call it good from now on.

Put soap, water, washing soda and borax with 5 gallons water and now it sets overnight to 'thicken'. We will see... but if it doesn't work I still figured out how to make my house smell clean in about 5 minutes. That lesson alone was worth the effort.

**UPDATE: Soap gelled together well. I'm pretty impressed with myself. I'm off to fill my old laundry soap container, add essential oil to it, and run a load of laundry. I'm feeling very Little House of the Praire, although I think they collected ash to make soap with. So not exactly the same. But nevertheless, still feeling very self sufficent. I wonder if you can make homemade dishwasher detergent. Google search here I come...