Today's Homemade: Laundry Soap

So I tried EcoNuts and I didn't love them.  Some of my clothes still had gudge on them after coming out of the dryer and I found myself constantly questioning if stuff was actually clean or not.  When you wash cloth diapers in the washing machine, you need to feel 100% certain that your clothes are clean as a whistle.

So I bought borax, washing soda and bars of castile soap to make my own.  I made it tonight, but I haven't had a trial run just yet.  I was going to throw some laundry in tonight, but it's late and I just didn't want to bother.

It's super easy to make laundry soap.  The only thing that was a pain in the neck was grating the bar of soap.  Next time, I'm going to chop it up and throw it in the food processor.

So here's the recipe (adapted from this):

1 C. grated castile soap
1 C. washing soda
1 C. borax
10 drops tea tree essential oil
10 drops eucalyptus essential oil
5 drops peppermint essential oil

Mix all ingredients and voila, laundry soap.  The essential oils you use are completely up to you.  I went with tea tree and eucalyptus for their anti-bacterial qualities and the peppermint I added simply to up the minty fresh smell.  The castile soap smelled so good, though, I almost didn't add any extra scent.

Use 1 tablespoon per laundry load, double or even triple for large or heavily soiled loads.  I'll probably use 2 tbsps. for my cloth diapers.