Washing a ton

We have used All Free and Clear for years (since the kiddos were little and dreft was very expensive.)  Recently, I was reading Soulemama's blog and under tutorials, she had a recipe for laundry soap.  Wow I thought, this is a great idea.  It is cheap, easy, and we basically already use most of the ingredients!  I modified it so that I use 2 whole bars of Dr. Bronner's soap to reduce the need to store grated soap for later.  In order to get this excellent price, I buy it by the case from our local organic farm food catalog, Frankferd Farms Foods, Inc. but more on them on a later date.

Homemade Laundry Powder

(Makes approximately 7 cups using 1/8 cup for a load)

2 bars (finely) grated Dr. Bronner's castile soap
(we use peppermint or lavender)
1.25 cups borax

1.25 cups baking soda

1.25 cups washing soda

I grated the bar soap with my food processor.  Then I poured in all the other items in after switching to the cutting blade.  This made the chunky bits of soap become small and worked in with the other powders.  It took me all of 5 minutes once I had all of the ingredients compiled.

Grinding up Soap

 Let's look at the cost effectiveness of this simple endeavor:

2 bars soap ($4.38)

1.25 cups borax (76 oz/$4.29 or $0.60/ 1.25 cups)

1.25 cups baking soda (192 oz/$21.25 or $1.10/1.25 cups)

1.25 cups washing soda (55 oz/$2.99 or $0.50/1.25 cups)

for a grand total of 56 loads for $6.58
or

$0.12 per load

whereas our regular detergent is 72 loads for $13.81

or

$0.19 per load

or

Save $0.07 per load for spending 5 minutes making a batch of detergent.

So much like the eggs...do it yourself for less and it is better for you!

The Finished Product

It's a no-brainer.