Homemade Powdered Laundry Detergent…and why I don’t use fabric softener.
A couple of years ago when my husband and I decided I would be the one to quit work to stay at home with our children it was one of the toughest things I had to deal with on an emotional level. Most moms dream of being able to afford to be a stay at home mom. In all honesty it was my dream too. But that was all it was…a dream. I was raised to believe that the only way to contribute to society was to be a hard worker, which to me meant working hard for someone else. Boy was I deluded:) Being a stay at home mom IS hard work. It’s a heck of a lot harder than working for someone else!
And when your household income is cut by one it’s an even bigger challenge. So I set out to WORK HARD to cut our household expenses. One of those things was to make most everything we use homemade instead of purchasing everything pre-made. Most everything in this house is homemade, either by me, my husband or our kids.
Homemade Powder Laundry Detergent is one of those things. With us having 4 kids and 2 adults in our home you can imagine the amount of laundry we have on a daily basis. Our laundry expense was ridiculous. The price of laundry detergent just kept going up and up in price and the load amount per box went down:( So I did what any hardworkin’ momma does and set out to figure out how to cut the expense. And boy did I.
Googling homemade powered laundry detergent results in numerous recipes that are different in some way or another. I played around with them until I came up with one that suites us but before I tell you what it is I want to tell you why we no longer use fabric softener either.
I used to use a couple dryer sheets per load. The detergent cleans our clothes but it doesn’t really have a smell and I LIKE that fresh clean smell that comes with clean clothes. BUT, no sooner than we would grab a fresh clean towel and dry off with it, it STANK (the towel, not us)! Usually I would go buy more and just cut the older ones up for my husband to use outside, but remember, I’m trying to cut our budget not add to it. And a bunch of new towels are not in the budget.
Well Google came to my rescue again. I found out, by doing some research, that fabric softener actually coats your clothes with a water proof barrier. Well, what cleans our clothes? WATER! So by using all that fabric softener I was actually preventing our clothes from getting clean. I had no idea! So now I use VINEGAR to help with static clean. I just fill up the section in the washing machine that you’re supposed to put liquid fabric softener in with vinegar and let it do it thing. Works like a charm. So to get the nice smell I was looking for by using fabric softener I now add Purex Crystals to my recipe of Homemade Powder Laundry Detergent.
Not only did I tell you all this for informational purposes and to help you cut your budget but if you will look in the picture of ingredients you won’t see the Purex Crystals. That’s because I took this picture before I found out this great information. As another FYI I don’t need to add bleach to our whites anymore either! Score 3 for me! Now on to the fabulous recipe…
- 1 Zote soap bar, finely shredded (I use an old cheese grater, DO NOT use your good food processor, it will ruin your blades)
- 1 cup Oxygen all purpose stain remover or Oxyclean
- 1 cup Arm and Hammer Super Washing Soda
- 1 cup Borax
- ½ cup Purex Crystals
- Pour all ingredients in a container mixing well.
- Use ⅛ cup scoop per load of laundry.
Sounds so easy but can I use it in my washer that says to use only HE detergents? Let me know so I can start making it too! I’m passing this one on to my granddaughter who loves to make homemade cleaning products!
Hey Regina,
I don’t own a HE washing machine but from doing some research I’ve learned that it is safe to use this laundry detergent in those machines. None of the ingredients in my homemade laundry detergent contain a sudsing agent. You can check out this link to read more or you can always contact the manufacturer. You definitely don’t won’t to use anything that might void a warranty.
Love this Adrian! We use the same exact “recipe” for our laundry soap. And we have an HE machine.. works great!
is there a way to make this like the “sports” wash (we have lots of stinky workout clothes)?
I’m not sure what you mean exactly by “sports” wash but I have a couple kids that play numerous sports and I use this exact recipe to wash their clothes and I’ve never had them come out smelling anything but clean. I wish I could send you a sample for you to try:(
Thanks for the recipe. Dumb question…where do we buy all these things? I have seen Borax in the stores… Not that I have looked for any of the others, though!
I purchase everything from Walmart in the laundry isle.
We make our own laundry detergent most of the time. Sometimes I can’t find what I need at the store, they don’t always keep it in stock, so then I will buy one of the smaller sizes of laundry detergent. I have to remember to give myself grace then, I would spend more driving around trying to find the ingredients than I would if I just buy the pre-made powder in those cases, so I don’t feel so bad.
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