Laundry Secret: I don’t use detergent 99% of the time

I understand about the harsh chemicals in regular detergent — they irritate my skin like you wouldn’t believe :/ I just use a home-made laundry detergent, and it works WONDERS <3  All you need to make it is: 

- 1 bar of soap (doesn't matter which kind)
- 1 box of Arm & Hammer washing soda
- 1 box of borax (not necessary, but recommended)
- a 5 gallon bucket with a lid
- 3 gallons of tap water
- one big spoon
- a measuring cup
- and one knife.

It'll take a full day to make this, but all you have to do is heat 4 cups of water in a pan to almost boiling, then take the knife and whittle down the entire bar of soap into the hot water; then stir until you have highly soapy water. 

Then put three gallons of hot water (about 3 gallon milk jugs worth); mix in the hot soapy water, stir for a while, then add a cup of washing soda, then stir a little more (then you can add half a cup of borax if you are using it). Stir a little more, then set overnight — the next day, just recycle the milk jugs to hold your homemade detergent!  

I have never thought of this and I will try it! Perhaps with just a tad of detergent for the extra dirty things I work in a office and my clothes never get very dirty, not even when I'm in the garden.
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Uh, I couldn't do this. Especially with sheets and towels, you have to use hot water and soap. Just because something looks clean doesn't mean it is. To wit, I've lived in Argentina, where most people take their clothes to full-service laundries (cheap, and I've never seen a self-service laundry there). Your clothes look clean when you get them back, but they aren't truly. All it takes is washing the piece of clothing with soap in a sink, and the water is instantly gray. I had to ask for perfume to not be used (smelled bad and covered up any unclean odors) and for double washing powder (they used some, but obviously not enough). Or maybe they didn't rinse the clothes properly — I dunno, but my clothes were not consistently clean.

I'm all for using less detergent, but using none is like saying just because it looks clean means it is clean. If you were hiking and you saw animal droppings in the water, would you still drink the water 15 feet away, because it "looked clean"? Nope.

what about unscented detergent? I use Dye and Perfume Free Laundry. eiher from my local grocery store or Trader Joes and I love it. It comes out clean and smelling like nothing. maybe i am just a neat freak that way?

This is very cool. I'm going to give it a try next time I do the laundry. I hate that detergent smell!

I'm all for cutting out as many chemicals as possible, and I SO want to do this, but I always cold water wash (for a couple of reasons – my clothes seem to last longer and I don't have to sort, which for me would be a waste of water and quarters since I never have a whole load of both lights and brights by the time I need more clean clothes). So I don't think it would work for me! Drat. However, I do use the environmentally friendly stuff, so my clothes don't come out smelling like freesia breeze, at least – just, as you said, fresh-without-being-nauseating.

I can see that with some things that are slightly worn, isn't stained, or doesn't touch the private parts of your body. But my underwear and workout clothes need SUDS. Plain water just won't do. If the chemicals or scent bothered me, I'd buy a green detergent or unscented detergents for sensitive skin.

Based on what I've read, this seems fine to me. Though I'd continue to use the dryer. The intense heat from the dryer is really what kills any bacteria living on the clothes and towels, not the warm or hot water. That's why it's always good to wash your hands after transferring a load from the washer into the dryer.

Yes! My BF's parents gave a set of these ceramic laundry discs: http://www.greenhome.com/products/housekeeping/la… that I've been using regularly. I was skeptical at first, but clothes do get clean. I continue to pretreat stains and bleach whites, but it seems like it's working. A message board over at snopes (http://msgboard.snopes.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=42;t=000233;p=1) seems to debunk their usefulness, but as long as it works for me, I'll keep using them.