Laundry Day... Errrrr Night

Years ago I decided that it would be a good idea to learn how to be self-sufficient. The kind of self-sufficiency that meant that if there ever were another depression, I would be prepared to do very valuable things like raise vegetables, can and freeze, sew anything, bake my own bread from scratch, and cook up just about anything I needed from scratch. I am pretty much a freak, I know.

We were newlyweds, and I brought my penny-pinching ways into my marriage. Luckily, my husband didn't mind sampling my pink homemade applesauce, and he waited months before I perfected lump less gravy. He also feigned interest as I explained and tried dozens of ways to make the perfect boiled egg. Now he likes to brag about my perfectly boiled eggs to others (how embarrassing!). I also found several recipes for making my own baking mix and my own ant repellant (it didn't work very well).

I have always loved frugality and we live pretty frugally, even when we have had more money than we do now. I joined the Frugal Homemakers group on Ravelry and noticed a thread for homemade laundry detergent. I was doubtful. Finally, I read it and was so excited that I had to wake up my husband to tell him all about how wonderful it would be when I started cooking up some laundry detergent. This was at midnight on a weeknight, so he wasn't really thrilled to hear about my new "experiment".

On Friday night I went out for my evening's entertainment. I went in search of these:



I went to four different stores in search of the ever elusive Arm & Hammer Washing Soda. Turned out that my regular grocery store had all three items, who knew? And all of the items were cheaper than what I had paid for them at the hardware store. Oh well, lesson learned.

I came home and started supper, and started shredding the Fels-Naptha soap



Then I cooked it up while we ate the real food. I was very careful not to confuse the pots and serve up soap soup.



Then I added the rest of the ingredients and set it aside for the night.



I had to wait until morning to see how it would turn out, so I will make you wait until morning as well. Sorry! I know that the suspense must be killing you. My husband also had a sleepless night, filled with fret about how my $8.00 experiment would turn out. And wondering if I would actually use the stuff.