As a correlating installment to last week's Homemade Dryer Sheets, I found this recipe for homemade liquid fabric softener! It had a few good reviews so I'm going to try it this week!
You can add some essential oil to the mixture for scent. It's available a your local natural or whole foods market or usually at candle shops.
Recipe courtesy Recipezaar.com
Ingredients
1 cup baking soda
6 cups distilled white vinegar
8 cups water
10-15 drops essential oil of choice (optional)
Directions
1) You will need a one gallon container.
2) First add the baking soda to the plastic container.
3) Next add 1 cup of water to start with.
4) Slowly add the vinegar to the bottle as the vinegar and baking soda will start to fizz.
5) Then add the rest of the water swirling around & cover venting the top a few times.
6) Last add the essential oil.
7) Add 1 cup in your final rinse cycle for each load but give the bottle a good shake to stir up the essential oil if using.
Let us know if you try this and what you think!
Sunday, March 2, 2008
Make It Yourself Monday: Eco-Friendly Fabric Softener (Part 2)
Sunday, February 24, 2008
Make It Yourself Monday: Eco-Friendlier Fabric Softener (part 1)
I discovered recently that dryer sheets (used and unused) are VERY dangerous for my pets (specifically 2 dogs who chew on EVERYTHING that's not tied down and looks remotely destructible - no, really just everything!). I read that if they ingested enough of them they could die from the toxicity. I'll have to find the specifics on this to add to the post later.
The point is that I wondered how on earth I could keep them from getting into them as they seem to end up lying all around they house after we do laundry. It's like someone used them for confetti.
In a recent issue of Mother and Child Reunion a contributor submitted an idea for a less expensive alternative to dryer sheets that I think is probably better for the environment (and my dogs).
Buy a box carton refill of any liquid fabric softener you like (or want to try). Pour the amount required for a single load into a container and leave a sponge or thick washcloth soaking in it. When you are ready to dry a load of laundry, ring out most of the liquid from the sponge or cloth and toss it in the dryer. When ringing use your best judgement, I think the idea is that there is no dripping but that there is enough to spread as the clothes are tossed about!
The idea is that your fabric softener will go 2-3x further and you will spare the landfills some waste!
Let's try it together this week and let us know how it went for you!
Next week's installment of MIYM is on Homemade Fabric Softener!
