Homemade Laundry Soap Recipe (the old fashioned way)

Tonight was our Relief Society Meeting. We did humanitarian school bag kits. But we also got a tip on kindling for lighting a fire that works every time and recipe for homemade laundry soap. She and her sister tried it for a week. They used it on some really dirty jeans and they came out clean. Plus it has a pleasant scent. You can find all the ingredients in the laundry isle of the grocery store, I am certain, because it is in both of our stores in this really small town. But you might have to look or ask.
Here is the recipe

Homemade Laundry Soap

1/3 bar Fels Naptha Soap
1/2 cup Washing Soda
1/2 cup 20 Mule Team Borax Powder

THIS MAKES 2 GALLONS OF SOAP. . . FOR LESS THAN A DOLLAR

Grate soap in sauce pan. Add 6 cups water and heat until soap melts. Add the washing soda and Borax and stir until it is dissolved. Remove from heat. Pour 4 cups hot water into bucket. Now add your soap mixture and stir. Add 1 gallon plus 6 cups of wter and stir. Let soap sit for about 24 hours and it will gel.

Use 1/2 cup per wash load

The soap is a low sudsing soap. So if you don't see suds, that's OK. Suds are not what does the cleaning, its the ingredients in the soap.


Pine Cone kindling

paper cupcake liners
pine cones
paraffin

Melt a bar of paraffin wax in can, inside a pan of boiling water. In a newspaper lined cookie sheet or casserole pan, place a pine cone in a cupcake liner and pour melted paraffin over pine cone. Let cool. Use in fireplace to start fire with some wadded up newspaper.

My friend says her family made and used these all her life growing up. They made them from pine cones they gathered in the woods. She tried it the other day and a tiny pine cone burnt for about 10 minutes after it got started with some newspaper.

So there are some great tips for the thrifty pioneer within you.

~a