Homemade Laundry Soap

Several months ago a friend gave me the ingredients to make a batch of homemade laundry soap.  I'm all about saving money so I gave it a try.  One batch fills a five gallon bucket and then you dilute that with water so one batch is actually 10 gallons.  That's right, 10 gallons!!!  The total cost of each batch is around $2.00, which is obviously a lot cheaper than buying it at the store.

When I made this extremely large batch of laundry soap, I thought it would take our little family a LONG time to use it all.  I love using the soap for our family, but it has been a huge blessing for (Cover)ed.  We wash the towels twice during the construction process.  We try to keep our construction costs as low as possible so we can have more money to donate or give to adoptive families.  We have learned that every penny, nickel and dime adds up quickly so saving on washing costs has been a huge blessing.

I just made a fresh batch of soap and thought I would share the recipe with you.  The recipe is from the Duggar family.  This liquid soap works for front load or top load machines.  We have a front load machine and it works great.  In my opinion it works just as well as any other store bought detergent.  I do pre-treat stains with Shout and sometimes allow a pretreated stains to soak depending on what they are. 

You will need three ingredients:  Fels-Naptha Heavy Duty Laundry Bar Soap, Arm and Hammer Super Washing Soda and Borax.  All of these can be found at Publix.  You will also need a five gallon bucket with a lid.  My friend gave me my bucket, but I'm sure you can get one at a hardware store.  You will also need an old liquid laundry detergent container. 

Take your bar of Fels-Naptha

and shred it, just like shredding cheese.  Nate loves shredded cheese and when he saw this he asked for some to eat.  

Combine the bar of shredded soap with 4 cups of warm tap water.  Heat that together on the stove over medium low heat until all of the soap is dissolved.

Then fill your bucket half full with hot tap water.  I put my bucket in the tub for this part.  Then pour in your dissolved soap mixture and 1 cup of Super Washing Soda. 

Then add 1/2 cup Borax.  Stir everything together, making sure all of the powder is dissolved.  Then add more warm/hot tap water until your bucket is full (I fill mine until about an inch or two of the bucket is showing). 

Cover the mixture and let sit 24 hours before using.  This waiting period allows everything to gel together.  And it really does gel together.  It's like you have a five gallon bucket of jello.  I tried to get a picture showing the texture of the soap, but I don't think I was very successful. 

When you are ready to use the soap, stir the mixture well.  I actually put several cups in a small bowl and stir it with a whisk to break up the large gelled pieces (this will make it easier to transfer to your container).  Fill half or your (clean) laundry detergent container with the soap mixture.  Fill the other half with warm water.  Put the top on and give it a good shake.  You're ready to wash clothes.  Easy Peasy. The Duggar's suggest using 1/4 cup in front load machines, but I use about 1/3 cup.  If it's a really large load, I use a little more.