DIY All-Natural Laundry Detergent

Natural cleaning products are SO EXPENSIVE you guys!  I just couldn't handle it anymore so I started searching all over creation and found a great recipe for laundry detergent at DIY Natural.  It works wonderfully, will last you a long time and is easily tranportable if you're a NYC'er and have to carry your laundry/gear to the laundromat (put it in a sandwich sized Ziploc).  

You'll need:

1 cup Borax Powder

1 cup Arm & Hammer Washing Soda

1 bar of laundry soap - Fel's Naptha or other

Essential Oil of choice (optional)

Blender

Food Processor or Cheese Grater

This is a different bar than Fels Naptha - Fels Naptha is what turns it yellow

Use your food processor or cheese grater to shred your bar of soap.  Pour that into your blender (I use a Ninja Blender which works really well) and add the Borax and the Washing Soda.  Add essential oil to your liking.  Blend til the soap is pulverized and everything is mixed together.  Use 1 Tbsp/load of laundry - yep!  One Tablespoon!

The first time I did this recipe I didn't pulverize everything in the blender and found that the soap "shreds" were too big for the washers at our laundromat and they didn't all make it into the wash easily - they got caught in the coils and didn't totally dissolve in cold washes.  So, that's when I started blending it all together and it's easy peasy now.  

The first time I made this recipe it also didn't have essential oil in there and I knew after reading THIS article that we associate clean clothes with clothes that SMELL clean, regardless of if they're clean or not.  So I needed some smell ya'll.  I did a bunch of batches with Lavender Oil but now I'm on a Grapefruit Oil kick - it's amazing!  I pop in about 1/2-1 tsp for a whole batch of detergent.

I also have really sensitive skin and have always bought the dye free formulas of laundry detergents at the store and this recipe works wonderfully for me.  If you have a significant stain you'll want to use a stain remover (I'm working on finding my favorite recipe to share with you!) but if you've got basic stinky clothes with normal wear and tear you'll be fine with this - it works wonderfully!  

For my favorite DIY Natural All-Purpose Cleaner click HERE.