DIY Laundry Soap :)

I made laundry soap!!!
Why am I so excited you ask? Well I have been making my own laundry soap for my family of four, for over a year and a half now and for having 3 year old twin boys who dirty up everything, it works pretty awesome. But it doesn't make my laundry smell good, it doesn't make it smell bad either, it just smells like nothing. I like that nice smell, I gotta have the nice smell! Then I stumbled upon a different recipe.
Okay, so I know that this is not the first blog post about making this laundry soap, nor did I come up with this recipe! I am not stealing or taking credit for it at all, In fact, I used this recipe found over { here }. I did however alter it a wee bit! Also, I put a list of where I found everything and how much each item cost! (I am in Canada, so finding ZOTE soap is not easy!)

(I JUST started my frist load of laundry with it, will give you an update of how well it worked! )


I started out with these ingredients;

- 1 box of Borax (Found at WalMart) Can't remember the price but will update when I do.
- 1 box Arm & Hammer Super Washing Soda (I found at Walmart the first time, but second time I had to go to Safeway!) $7.47
- 1 bottle of Purex Scent Crystals (Found this at Super Store on sale!) $5.47
- 1 box of Oxy Clean or equivalent. Not necessary but I used it because with 3 year old twin boys it helps! (Found at Wal Mart) $3.77 (I think!)
- 2 bars of Sunlight Laundry Soap. They called for ZOTE soap of Fels Naptha two soaps that I have yet to see anywhere here in Canada! (Found this at Wal Mart) Around $2
- 2 boxes of baking soda (Found at Wal Mart) Not 100% sure on the price of these, my mom picked them up for me! I do know you can get them for $1 at Dollarama!

You are also going to need a very large bucket to store this in! I use an old dog food bucket, works great :)

First, you want to grate the soap. I have made many batches of laundry soap before, but have never used Sunlight before and I gotta say, I loved this soap just for the fact that it was very easy to grate and broke down very easily!

So in the tutorial, they suggested you pour a little of each ingredient at a time in the bucket, then mix. Then pour a little of each ingredient again, then mix, layering it. So that is is what I did! Be very careful while mixing, this stuff is potent and it puffs up in your face when your pouring it in! NOT cool.

This is how much powder I had in my bucket when I was finished, about half full! Not bad considering I will be only filling half of the purple lid from the purex bottle!

Next, just take your empty Purex Crystals bottle and fill'er up! I used a measuring cup to fill it and held it inside the big bucket to lessen that powder that would puff up in my face.

And, Tadah! You know have your new laundry soap! Just look inside the lid of your Purex bottle, there should be 3 very faint lines, fill it to the middle line and pour that in with every load! That is approx. 2 tbls. Like I said, I just tested this out on my first load of laundry so I will give an update on how well it worked, but I am already thinking I will love it way more than the liquid stuff I was making. PLUS, it made my house smell GREAT! Oh, and another plus, instead of having my laundry room shelf lined with old bottles that I used for my liquid diy laundry soap, I only have one! Ignore the dirty shelves!!! It's one place that doesn't get much TLC...

from this;

to this;

Nice and de-cluttered! (Note I said de-cluttered, not clean! Hehe)
What kind of laundry soap have you tried making and using and did you like them better than the store bought stuff?

On a side not, I just thought I would add that the liquid laundry soap that I have been making for about a year and a half consisted of Borax, Super Washing Soda, water and 1 bar of soap which cost me about $13 to purchase, and I still have some Borax and Super Washing soda left! I made 1 big batch about every 4-5 months and all I had to purchase was a bar of soap for $1, that is a huge savings on laundry soap! About $18 for a year and half's worth of laundry! SO, I will definitely give you an update after a year to see how much my savings were with this laundry soap recipe!