homemade wash powder question

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Permalink Reply by Cornelia on March 28, 2011 at 9:18am

Uh oh...I was planning to do this soon, and thought that my regular old box grater would work. I wasn't going to use fels naptha, but a bar of lavender goat soap from Wicked Garden. Was the soap too hard to grate? I guess another option would be a wood planer, but that seems a bit extreme...

Permalink Reply by Shellie A. Gades on March 28, 2011 at 9:21am

Cornelia: That's what my friend and I have kind of concluded that the Fels Naphtha was just too hard. We are going to use the Ivory soap next trial. I have also spoken with a lady who uses the Fels Naphtha in her liquid soap, but she has to break it down in hot water. Maybe that's the key. So conclusion being the softer soap is the choice for the grated dry soap powder.

Permalink Reply by Juli on March 31, 2011 at 9:44pm

I've been making my own laundry powder for years and recently quit using any bar soap at all. But ....

To start with i only used Ivory, fels naptha is pretty harsh. Then i switched to my own cold press lye soap.  I've always used a manual cheese grater for the bar soap but then add the grated soap to the rest of the powder and let it set for a day or two, the powder draws out the moisture and makes it easier to process in the blender.  I thin used the blender to turn the whole thing into a fine powder to dissolve in cold water.

 

For the last 3 months or so I have been using it without any bar soap at all. We moved and I was low on bar soap so i made up a batch without and used it to see. The laundry came out every bit as clean as it did when using the bar soap. I won't be going back.

 

My particualr recipe is equal amounts Borax, Washing Soda & Baking Soda. people freak out on the baking soda but it acts like a water softener and we have pretty hard well water. I use regular or lavender infused vinegar in the rinse.

Permalink Reply by Shellie A. Gades on April 4, 2011 at 1:45pm

Juli - thank you for the tips. Do you run into any discoloring issues like with whites?