Homemade Laundry Soap

I was a little skeptical on whether or not homemade laundry soap would clean my clothes as well as the store bought soap but I thought I would give it a try anyway. The results were amazing. Our clothes are clean and each load costs pennies to run through the washer. I broke down the costs and the savings was incredible. In the ingredients listed below, excluding the essential oils, I paid under $1.00 per 3 gallon bucket of homemade Laundry soap! Unbelievable.
I love it that God gives me ways to help with the family budget.

Supplies:

Cheese grater
3 gallon bucket (pick one of these up at your local donut shop or bakery)
Stock pot or large pan (Set this pan aside for soap making only. If you don't have a spare pan for soap making, you can find one at a yard sale or thrift shop)
Spatula - for stirring the soap
wire whisk - not shown in picture

Ingredients:

4 quarts of water
1/2 cup 20 Mule Team Borax
1/2 cup Arm & Hammer Washing Soda (NOT baking soda!)
1/6 to 1/3 of a bar of grated Zote soap

or

1/3 to 1/2 of a bar of Fels Naptha soap(after trying both, I prefer Zote)

Optional: Rose water or favorite essential oil

Directions:
1. Grate Zote soap (or Fels Naptha soap)
2. Heat water on medium heat in pan

3. Add Borax and Washing Soda to water.
4. Stir until Borax and Washing Soda are disolved.
This step shouldn't take long.

5. Add grated Zote soap (or Fels Naptha).
Keep mixture on medium heat.

6. Stir soap until COMPLETELY disolved. This will take some time (approx. 15 minutes, give or take a few) but it is very important that there are no flakes of soap left floating in the water. Continue to keep on medium heat until the mixture is completely disolved.

7. Pour hot mixture into your bucket. This mixture should be approxamatly 1/3 of the 3 gallon bucket.

8. Let it cool completely. I let mine cool over night. It will become like a jello consistancy, maybe even thicker.
9. When completely cooled, add another 2 quarts of very hot water to the mixture. Using your wire whisk, mix the hot water and cooled soap very briskly back and forth until the mixture becomes somewhat smooth or mostly without lumps. The soap may sud a little during this process.
10 After mixing all or most of the lumps out, add enough hot water to fill the rest of the bucket with a couple inches of head space at the top. Let the Laundry soap cool completely.
11. After soap is cooled, this would be a good time to add your essential oils if you plan to do so.
12. Fill a smaller spouted plastic container with the cooled laundry soap for easy pouring.

Happy soap making!

~ Christa ~

Special thanks to Donna Konvalin for helping me with the pictures in this article.