Laundry Soap Day!!!

We love the Old Road wherever we can find it. We especially love travelling Route 66. However, that takes money. We live simply and are fairly frugal. One of the ways we save money for the Old Road is making our own laundry soap. It's easy to make in about 30 minutes, with just a few simple ingredients.

You need washing soda, borax and a good laundry soap bar. I prefer Fels Naptha, but other recipes I've see use Zotes or even Ivory.

 We grate 1/3 of a bar of Fels Naptha...

And add it to six cups of hot water.... Then stir it over medium heat until the completely melts...

 Add 1/2 cup of washing soda (this is not baking soda), and 1/2 cup of borax. Arm & Hammer makes the washing soda and 20 Mule Team makes a borax.

Continue to stir on medium heat until the washing soda and borax are dissolved and you don't feel any grit on the bottom of the pan.

Pour 4 cups of hot water in the bucket...

 Pour in the soap mixture...

Now... add 1 gallon and 6 cups of water to the bucket... that's 22 cups of water. I use hot but the recipe I use didn't specify hot or cold.

Stir well...

Finally, put on the top and let it sit over-night. I stir it once or twice and by morning it should look like a watery gel and is ready to use! We pour it into old detergent bottles.

It yields about a gallon and a half that's 128 ounces.

A 100 oz bottle of Tide costs about $12  and the ingredients for my soap cost around $15.... however those ingredients will yield about 9 - 128 ounce buckets. We've made it three times so far and have hardly made a dent in the borax or washing soda. I also use the borax and washing soda with salt to make a scouring powder.

So every time we make this laundry soap, we put $10 in the road trip fund! It doesn't sound like a lot, but it adds up over time. In a year it could add up to 3 tanks of gas or for us 900 miles on our favorite road!!! :)

Oh, many thanks to The Family Homestead for the recipe. http://www.thefamilyhomestead.com/laundrysoap.htm