Tammy's Recipes

I have made home made laundry detergent, and while I saved money, and I felt really good about it, after about a month, my clothing was very dingy.

I also had a problem with not being able to get rid of the smell in armpits.

I use Aldi's Tandil. It is the same thing as Tide, and then I use ½ of the smallest amount called for. 1 jug lasts me about 2-3 months, and I do 12 loads of laundry a week.

I also use 1 c. of vinegar for my rinse. I scent this with essential oils.

We don't own a dryer either, so I too, am longing for warmer weather here in Ohio.

I have made home made laundry detergent before, and while it saved me money and I felt really good about doing it, after about a month, all my clothing began to look dingy. Especially the whites.

I also had trouble with not being able to get out armpit smell.

I use Aldi's Tandil. It is the same thing as Tide. I also use about ½ the smallest amount called for, so 1 jug lasts me about 2-3 months doing 12 loads a week.

We don't own a dryer either, so I use 1 c. of vinegar scented with essential oils for rinse.

I have made homemade laundry soap and have never been happy with it, everything looked dingy after a couple of washings. I went back to my Tide (the only one that I can use without skin problems either for me or dh) even with his filthy work clothes Tide gets them clean! I do use Oxiclean too because it works so well.

I use homemade laundry powder, and cold water exclusively, and I've never once found undisolved powder crystals.

I've made it with Borax, Washing Soda, and grated Irish Spring; and with Borax, Washing Soda, and Sun powdered detergent.

I use ~2 TB per load, and my clothes come out very clean. I'm pretty picky about my laundry, and towels & whites get an extra rinse cycle just to make sure all the germs & chemicals are gone.

I've been doing this almost a year, and have noticed no extra wear on our clothes.

I love Charlie's Soap (available online). My daughter started using it first since it was good for diapers and one of her children is highly sensitive to any fragrance in soap.

One nice thing about Charlie's, once you've used it for awhile (and all detergent gets out of your clothes), you rarely need fabric softener. That saves money. I now only keep it for when I wash sweaters or items that I know have a lot of static cling.

There are only three of us at home now so I find one package can last me six months.

After reading that you omitted the bar soap due to rinsing issues, I looked at your tutorial closely and opted to just mix the borax and washing soda and leave it as a powder. I use between 1-2 tablespoons of the powder and then a bit of Tide and have been mostly happy with the results. My husband farms and works with cattle, though, so his work clothes get more of both!

I have not yet found the magic combination to get my diapers as clean as I'd like, though. I use pocket diapers and microfiber inserts - which I *love* for diapering purposes. I try to be sparing with the borax/WS because I think they are harsh but help get things clean, and I try to use enough Tide that they come out clean but not too much that it doesn't rinse well. I give my covers a sniff when they come out of the wash, and it seems that probably every third time I wash diapers, I end up running them through another cycle.

But, living in the middle of nowhere, I have found that extra cycles are worth not having to either make a trip to the nearest town to buy overpriced disposables or making a longer trip to the nearest small city to buy disposables.

We did before, but found we did not like the results from it.
I though have a front loading washer that uses very little soap and I bought a large jug that usually will do 150 loads I think and since I have a front loader it will do twice that amount. It was a healthy for you one from Costco, not Kirkland, some other brand, I bought it in July and I am so happy with it! It was $11 and is a little more than half gone.

I've been making our detergent for 4 years now. Borax, washing soda, and grated fels naptha or Ivory. I don't boil it ... I just keep it dry. And I wash all our stuff in cold water only. I do still need a bit of bleach in the whites every now and again ... but I don't mind that cuz you get that even with storebought detergent. The only time I've EVER had a problem with undissolved detergent was when my husband did our laundry and he used too much of the detergent.

I haven't noticed any extra wear on our clothes ... everything comes out very clean (and that's even when our girl, who's 4 now, would have blowouts all up the back when she was a baby!) ... and most times I've found we don't even need to use fabric softener sheets (actually, during winter when washing lots of sweatshirts and sweaters is the only time we need 'em). I like it MUCH better than storebought and love how it saves us a lot of money (there's only 3 of us right now ... baby #2 due in Sept. though ... and we only have to do laundry once a week, though we do use a washer at the laundrymat that holds 3 loads in one)

Brandy
http://emergentmindedchristfollowers.com/brandy

Will it sufficiently remove grease stains form food. Some of my kids are messy eaters and too old for a bib hence the grease stains! That has always been my issue with cheap store bought as well. I always needed to use spray and wash in combination. now I switched to tide and the results a great BUT the cost is also "great" unfourtounately and you can imagine how much laundry dtergent I go through for a family of 10!!!!

We've been making laundry soap for quite a while. I make the dry version (1 bar of fels naptha + 1/2 cup washing soda + 1/2 cup borax). We make a batch a couple times a year for around $15-20 and that lasts us for 6 months (family of 8). I find it is easier in the summer, though, so this summer I plan to do a full year's worth of soap at once. My key to success is to buy the bars of soap well in advance (a month or more) and unwrap them so they are very dried out. I then cut them into cubes and let them dry a little longer--this is why I prefer summer, the soap gets really dried out. Then I grind them into a fine powder using my food processor. If they are not fully dry, the soap still says in small chunks, but if the soap is very dry, it blends well with the other ingredients and dissolves quite nicely in the washer.

I made a huge batch of homemade laundry soap. The results were just fine. I used it all and had no problems. Have been too lazy to make a new batch even though I have everything on hand. I've found Arm & Hammer on sale cheap enough that I haven't minded just buying it. With the cost of everything going up so much I will probably get motivated to make more to help with the summer entertainment bills [i.e. trip to water park, camping etc]

If you are a CVSer (see Crystal over at moneysavingmom.com!), Tide is on sale for $4.99 every 6-8 weeks. According to my price book, this is BY FAR the cheapest around here! It is a 32 load bottle. Regular and HE brands.

And if you buy it on ECBs, it's free!

:)

-Lauren

Well for me it hasn't been harsh on clothes only on the stains!! But the price is rather harsh!
mama

I made the powdered version, using Fels Naptha, Borax, and washing soda and was not too fond of it. The detergent dissolved just fine but did not find it too effective on cleaning. Some of the clothes came out of the dryer with stains and I had to prespot them and place them back in the hamper... not too frugal to have to wash them again. Also, some odors still lingered on some of my pet blankets, socks, rags, etc.
I decided to but some Costco Kirland detergent which came to $.07 a load and so far I have been happy with it. I will try to keep everyone updated. Thank you Tammy for your wonderful website.

Does anyone have any experience using hydrogen peroxide or another homemade, safe whitener to whiten their whites? I've never used bleach, but it sort of freaks me out (staining other clothes). Thanks!