10/30/2009

Talk dirty to me

“My mom’s a clean freak,” my daughter tells her friend. They’re working on a science fair project in the playroom when I pop in to borrow back my measuring cup.

Anyone looking around that room would probably disagree with her assessment I am not sure I can actually remember what the floor of our playroom looks like but my daughter’s friend is fascinated by the fact that I need the measuring cup so I can mix up my own laundry detergent.

“Don’t you buy that at the store?” she asks.

“It has stuff in it,” my daughter Annie says. “My mom hates when there’s stuff in stuff that doesn’t have to be there.”

She’s right. Ever since Annie was born, I’ve been obsessed with the ingredients labels on cleaning products, and what I often see there just plain freaks me out. If I can’t pronounce it, I’m not sure I want it in my house. Inevitably, I discovered that it’s totally possible and actually cheaper, for us to make your own laundry detergent, and I’ve been doing it ever since.

“Want to help?” I ask.

Annie pretends to roll her eyes she’s 8, so she’s way cooler than I am these days but she follows her friend and me into the basement, where I toss them each a grater and a chunk of Fels-Naptha soap. (You can order it online at www.SoapsGoneBuy.com) It takes about one bar of soap to equal 1 cup of grated soap, which is what our recipe calls for.

Grating soap is surprisingly fun. The girls are giggling as they scrape the soap across the grater, making a soft white pile of flakes in the bowl beneath them.

“It’s just like cheese,” Annie’s friend says.

When they’ve finished grating, I stir in 1/2 cup of borax and 1/2 cup of washing soda. The only laborious part of making laundry soap is that you have to stir the ingredients together for about 5 minutes to be sure that they are completely combined, but Annie and her friend took over, and I had to tell them it was time to stop when they’d been at it for about 15 minutes.

We transferred the soap mixture to an empty spaghetti jar from our recycle pile. We’ll use about a tablespoon of soap for most regular loads and a scoop for the big messes, and a batch this size will see us through around 50 loads of laundry.

“That’s so cool that your mom does that,” my daughter’s friend says as she and Annie head back to the playroom and their science project. “I’m totally going to make my own laundry cleaner when I grow up.”

Sometimes, it really is easy being green.

–Lucy