Homemade Laundry Detergent

  So I have been wanting to do this for a while and it seems like there are so many different recipes for DIY laundry detergents. The funny part of this is that my husband has been the one pushing for us to use homemade detergent, which for those who know him is pretty out of character. He did most of the research and would send me links to multiple recipes, and so I finally set aside some time and made some detergent. This recipe is one I stumbled on and thought it looked the easiest and it addressed the question of whether you can use it with a HE washer which is what we have.

The essential oil is not pictured here, but you can use whichever scent you like best

Essentially what I did was purchase a large plastic bucket with a lid at Wall-mart and dumped all the ingredients inside and stir. The only extra step is you need to grade the Fels-Naptha with a normal cheese grader. It will come out looking like cheese does when you grade it. At that time you can add it to the mixture, but I took it a step further and blended it a make a refined powder.

Blended the Fels-Naptha a few times in the blender before adding it to the batch

    After everything is mixed stir well and there you go easy as pie. For a normal washer add 2-3 tablespoons to the water and let it wash. It can also be used in front loading HE washing machines! Since homemade laundry detergent doesn’t contain a sudsing agent it is safe for a high-efficiency washer. For front-loading machines, use about two tablespoons of your homemade  detergent and mix the detergent with two tablespoons of hot water before adding to the dispenser. 

   I put the majority of the mixture in the blue tub, seen in the background for storage, and then filled the smaller container with detergent so that I can use daily and it won't be such a chore getting down from the shelf in the laundry room. I will let you know how it all goes I have high hopes, and maybe just maybe my husband might do more laundry!