For the past few years now, my Mumsy has been an Admin over at the Down To Earth Forum, working alongside some very lovely ladies including Rhonda Hetzel. And for years now, my Mumsy has been subtly hinting that there are some easy, cost effective changes I could be making around my home.
Three years later, I finally get the hint and made my own batch of laundry detergent. Very, very simple, took me less than half an hour to wash bottles and my bucket, heat some ingredients and five litres of homemade laundry liquid into some bottles.
I only used about $1 worth of those ingredients (my shopping list cost about $12 so there’s plenty left for future batches). And if I was going to buy 5Ltr of Dynamo, I would pay $9 per litre. I just saved $44. Too lovely!
I halved the recipe to make 5 litres instead of 10 because let’s be honest, I was skeptical.
Funny story, as I began boiling some water for this recipe…I BURNED it. That’s right, the water in my pot was actually smoking not steaming. (Must have had some traces of bicarb in the pot left over from washing up!)
Ingredients
2 cup Lux Flakes
½ cup washing soda
½ cup bicarb (some recipe’s call for Borax…bicarb works and there’s some serious nasties in Borax)
This recipe will make TEN litres.
Just add the soap (flakes or grated), the bicarb, and washing soda to 1½ Litres of water and pop it on to boil. Gentle boil, lots of stirring.
Once everything had thoroughly and definitely dissolved, I moved from the kitchen into the laundry.
I had the kids fill up a bucket with water for me (about 9½ litres) and tipped my soapy mix in, gave it a big stir and…
Started pouring the laundry liquid into my pre-washed bottles.
For the record…. I do not drink Coke. Eugh! The Coke bottles belong to The Hubby who bravely palates the taste of Coke by mixing it with his scotch. However, I’ve recently discovered that Coke is one of those super cleaners – I’ve been using it to wash the toilet, the bath, it gets dried makeup off the bathroom basin…who knew!?
Bottles are labeled (including the ingredients in case a furry baby or one of the kids ingests it, I’ll have the ingredients on hand for when the Poisons InfoLine or Emergency Room triage nurse asks for them)
Shake well before use – the mixture will separate over time. For me…I’m quite happy to spend a few moments shaking my laundry liquid if it means saving $8 a bottle.
So there you have it. My clots are coming out clean for a fraction of the cost and I’ve just reduced the number of chemicals I’m bringing into my home.
Elizabeth Nesbitts Blog 