Getting the Laundry Done, the Living on Less Way

Before I get to the subject of laundry, I want to expand upon my prior posts on grocery shopping and saving money.  In making a change of any kind in your life, you need to take baby steps.  Changing everything all at once can set you up for failure.  So, take baby steps when you are trying new ways to save some money, otherwise you will become overwhelmed and get discouraged.

In addition, it is the pennies, nickels and dimes that you save that add up to the dollars that can be saved or used to pay down debt.  What is it they say?  Take care of the pennies and the dollars will take care of themselves.  This is so true, now on to the subject of laundry.

One major way I save on laundry is to make my own laundry soap.  For years I would just go down the laundry aisle at the grocery store and grab a bottle of laundry detergent and throw it in the cart.  I never really thought about it.  Then one day I looked at the receipt and noticed that I was spending about $5.00 on a bottle of laundry detergent and I was also spending quite a bit on fabric softener.  I knew that there had to be a better way.  I came across the Soaps Gone Buy website and decided I would give making my own laundry soap a try.  Fortunately I didn’t have to buy Fels Naptha Soap online as it is available in our local grocery stores as is Washing Soda and Borax.

If you make your own laundry soap you will definitely save money but I can tell you this, either you will love the laundry soap or you won’t.  There doesn’t seem to be any middle ground.  There are two recipes:  a liquid version and a powdered version.  I have tried both recipes and they are equally good at cleaning our clothes.  The liquid version is the cheapest by far.  I calculated the cost one day and it costs me 1 cent per load.  The homemade recipes do not produce suds as do commercial products.  The suds are not necessary to clean the clothes and the clothes will not be laden with a heavy fragrance.

The only time I use a commercial detergent is if I have a great coupon.  If I can get commercial detergent for $1.00 or less for a 32 load bottle (after using a coupon of course), I will buy it and keep it on hand if I should run out of my homemade version.  I never use the amount called for on the bottles.  I always use a little less and have never noticed a difference in getting my clothes clean.

I use fabric softener on my clothes. I purchase bottles of fabric softener on sale and use a coupon.  I recently purchased a 52 load size bottle of Downy for $2.00.  It will last far longer than the 52 loads advertised on the bottle as I have come to find that 1 ½ teaspoons of fabric softener is plenty to soften my clothes.

A simple and frugal softener for your clothes can be found in your kitchen cupboard.  Vinegar – what would we do without it?  Use ½ cup in the rinse cycle to soften your clothes and as an added benefit it will break down any remaining detergent residue on your clothes.

As to stain removal, I keep a bucket in my laundry room and use it to soak any clothes that have stains on them.  My favorite stain removal product is Dawn Original Blue dish detergent and a nice firm toothbrush for scrubbing.  Put a little dab of Dawn on a stain, dampen a little and then scrub with a tooth brush and allow it to soak for a while.  Then wash as usual.

I have also taken a bar of Fels Naptha soap and rubbed it over a stain, dampened it and scrubbed it and it will remove most stains.

Deal with stains right away.  Sometimes a quick splash of cold water on a stain in order to keep it wet until you can deal with it helps.

Hang your clothes outside to dry.  My mom hung all the clothes on the line from spring into almost winter and that is what I am doing.  There is nothing like the fresh smell of clothes hanging out on a line, especially bedding.

First of all we do not have vinyl siding on our house, so I put two hooks on the back side of our house and then put another hook across our yard near our garage.  I string a clothes line in a V shape on laundry day.  I always take the clothes line down at the end of the day and never leave it up over night.  I purchased some clothes line props online at Amazon.  Clothes line props hold up the clothes line so the line doesn’t sag to the ground under the weight of the clothes.  They have paid for themselves over time.

I hang towels on the line and then when they are almost dry, I bring them inside and dry them for another 10 minutes in my dryer.  This guarantees that they will be nice and fluffy.  Otherwise, everything else is dried on the line.  I used to have an umbrella style clothes line apparatus, but I didn’t like it.  It seemed to take longer for the clothes to dry as the air wasn’t circulating to the clothes in the center.

Drying your clothes on the clothes line has benefits.  First, it saves the wear and tear on your clothes.  When you dry your clothes in a dryer and you remove the lint from the lint tray, where does that lint come from?  It comes from the wear and tear from drying your clothes in the dryer.  Second, the sunlight bleaches the whites and helps remove stains.  Three, the clothes smell wonderfully fresh from being dried outside and Fourth, it obviously saves on your utility bill.  This summer I could not fathom using my dryer when I had the air conditioner on.  It just didn’t make sense.

Now for some recipes:

Liquid Laundry Soap

1/3 Bar of Fels Naptha Soap, grated

1/2 cup Arm n Hammer Washing Soda (Not Baking Soda!!)

1/2 cup Borax

1 Quart hot water

Clean – 2 gallon bucket

Mix grated Fels Naptha soap in a pot with 6 cups of hot water and heat on low until dissolved.   Add Washing Soda and Borax and stir until slightly thickened.  Remove from heat.   Add 1 quart hot water to the 2 gallon Bucket.   Add soap mixture, and mix well.   Then fill the bucket completely with additional hot water, and mix well. Cover and set aside for 24 hours, or until mixture thickens. Warning – if you have small children, you should cover the bucket and put it somewhere where they cannot get into it.

After 24 hours I take a wire whisk and stir up the soap to break it apart.  The consistency will be that of curdled milk.  I then pour it into old laundry detergent bottles that I have saved.  Just shake the jug before using it.  To give you an idea of how much this makes, from one 2 gallon recipe I end up with 5 – 32 load size jugs of soap.  Use 1/2 cup of mixture per load.  (I use 1/3 cup and have found that it works great) Cost per load:  1 cent.

As you may guess I have an old stock pot that I use to make the soap in and that is all I use it for.

Powdered Laundry Detergent

1 cup grated Fels Naptha Soap

1/2 cup Arm and Hammer Washing Soda (Not Baking Soda)

1/2 cup Borax

I take the Fels Naptha soap and process it in an old food processor.  Be careful when you open the food processor as soap dust will fill the air and you don’t want to breathe this in.  Mix the grated soap with the Washing Soda and Borax and store in an airtight container or bag.  For light loads use 1 tablespoon.  For normal loads, use 2 tablespoons.  For heavy loads, use 3 tablespoons. Cost per “normal” load:  7.5 cents.

Homemade  Fabric Softener:

6 cups water

3 cups vinegar

2 cups hair conditioner

Mix together and use 1/4 cup per load