Clear Dye Free Homemade Laundry Detergent

I know a lot of you have seen the recipes for homemade laundry detergent. Recently, I came across one that uses Dawn dish liquid. In this recipe there is no need to shave down the bar soap and melt it on the stove. While talking with my sister, she mentioned that she would like to try to make her own homemade detergent. However, she usually buys the clear detergent at the store. But, on her last visit they had raised the price by a few dollars. So, I came up with this recipe for my sensitive-skinned sister ;) This recipe uses Dawn Pure Essentials Dye Free Hypoallergenic Dish Liquid instead of the Original Blue Dawn.

Recipe: 1/2 cup Borax, 1/2 cup Super Washing Soda, 1/2 cup Dawn Pure Essentials Dye Free Dish Liquid, Water

I just used a large plastic orange juice jug that I had washed out, to make and store this in. (You can use any plastic jug up to 1 gallon size.)
First, fill the jug about 2/3 of the way to the top with warm water. Then, add the Borax and Super Washing powders to the water using a funnel. Close the top of the jug and shake to dissolve the powders. After the powders have dissolved you can add in the Dawn dish liquid and fill the jug the rest of the way to the top leaving a little room to shake and mix in the Dawn. I suggest adding the Dawn at the end. If you try to add everything to the bottle first and then fill with water, the dish soap will foam up and you will have a jug full of bubbles spilling out of the top as you are trying to fill the jug with water. I left this just sit on the counter overnight and then tried it the next morning. In my mind, I thought it would be watery like dish water but to my surprise it was thick and resembled the consistency of liquid laundry detergent you would buy in the store. I threw a cup in the washer and it worked fine.

Homemade Laundry Soap

I'm sure a lot of you have seen this homemade laundry detergent recipe on the internet lately. Just in case you haven't, this was my experience making the detergent for the first time.

Basically, the soap is made from 4 household ingredients. Bar Soap, Washing Soda, Borax and Water.

I'll quickly give you a run down of the process.

First, you take a bar of soap and grate it on a box grater. I used a bar of Fels-Naptha laundry soap. (I have also used one called Zote that can sometimes be found in the laundry isle or can be found in a Hispanic store.) However, you can use any bar soap that you like. 

Then, you need to melt down the soap you grated. Put about 4 cups of water in a pot and bring it to a boil. Turn it down to a simmer and add the soap shavings to the water a little at a time. You can stir it around with a spoon to help it along.

Also, you need to get a large container/bucket of some sort with a lid. Fill the large container with 2-3 gallons of hot water.

Pour your melted soap mixture into the hot water along with 1 cup of Super Washing Soda and 1/2 cup of Borax.

Stir with a large spoon until all the powders have dissolved. Then you are supposed to put the lid on your container and let it sit for 24 hours until it gels.

Let me just tell you that washing soda can be hard to find. Many stores do not carry it. I realize that washing soda and baking soda are 2 different things. But, I wanted to make the soap and couldn't find any washing soda. So, I just threw in a cup of the baking soda instead. Because in my mind the soap you use is for it's cleaning properties. The borax is a laundry booster that softens hard water which helps your detergent work better. The baking soda has sanitizing and deodorizing benefits which is the same thing the washing soda does.

I let my detergent sit for 12 hours. I couldn't help myself and took the lid off to see what it looked like. What I found was that the top half of the mixture had formed into a thick gelatinous substance. Under the gel it just seemed to be soapy water. So, I took a spoon and broke up the gel and mixed it all up again. After a few more hours I checked it again and found that the whole container was now gelled at this point. I'm guessing if I would have left it the full 24 hours without messing with it, it probably would have all been gelled.

When it was finished I ended up with a very thick gel. To wash your clothes, just dip out a cup of the gel and add it to your washer like you would with any other laundry detergent. Don't worry about its Jello-like appearance, it will dissolve in the water. This is a low sudsing detergent so don't freak out if you don't see a lot of bubbles in the washer. Also, the color and scent of your detergent will vary depending on which bar soap you use.

From what I have calculated, I could probably make laundry detergent for a year for about $12.00!
I would still suggest pre-treating tough stains before washing.

I liked the fresh smell of this detergent. I have started using this soap to scrub down things all around the house now.