My roommates (husband and brother) are still teasing me for mixing up my own dry shampoo. It was a good plan, but it convinced me I had lice every day made my head itch like whoa.
But my days of mixing up natural cleaning stuff aren’t over yet! I saw this recipe for a natural dishwasher detergent on Pinterest. We were out of soap for the d-washer, so I gathered materials and made a batch.
Mix 1 cup Borax, 1 cup washing soda, 1/2 cup kosher salt, and 1/2 cup citric acid to make the detergent. I couldn’t find citric acid, so I substituted Lemi-Shine. All of these ingredients are available at grocery stores. Do yourself a favor and add a little scoop of rice into this stuff. It gets pretty clumpy, especially in the SC humidity.
When you’re ready to wash, put 1 tablespoon into your detergent spot. Oh, and add white vinegar in the rinse agent part of your dishwasher.
I’ve run the dishwasher four times with this concoction so far. And so far, I’ve rewashed two glasses and a fork that didn’t seem quite clean. Honestly our dishwasher isn’t the best, so I’m not sure whose fault it was.
The run down: it cost me about as much to all of these ingredients as it costs to buy those little “action pac” jelly things and this stuff will make a ton of all-natural dishwasher detergent. My one batch barely made a dent in those boxes.
So now I’m exploring the possibility of mixing up other cleaning products. Next on my list are this recipe for Ghetto Febreeze and this one for laundry detergent. Pinterest and the blog world are busting at the seams with recipes for this kind of thing right now, so there are ideas everywhere.
Have you ever made your own cleaners? Have any success with it? Or do you think I’ve lost my marbles?
<3, Liz
Domesticated Artists 