Forget Store-Bought Fabric Softener: She Makes Her Own With Something From the Shower
Fabric softener is usually another bottle to pick up in the laundry aisle, but this homemade version starts with something found in the shower. Mixed with hot water and white vinegar, it creates a large batch that can be stored beside the washing machine and dispensed as needed.
Home creator DeeDee from Clover House uses hair conditioner as the third ingredient, choosing a scented formula that gives the mixture its fragrance. The recipe calls for six cups of hot water, two cups of conditioner, and three cups of white vinegar, with no powders to dissolve or long list of ingredients to measure.
Changing the conditioner also changes the scent, which makes the recipe easy to adapt without changing the process. The finished Kiwi Lime batch takes on the pale green color of the conditioner before going into a reused container and a smaller jar kept in the laundry room.
Three Ingredients Make the Whole Batch
Hot water, white vinegar, and hair conditioner are all that go into this version. The conditioner is the unexpected part: instead of going on hair, an entire bottle becomes part of a laundry mixture that can be made in one bowl.
The original recipe uses a 15-ounce bottle, or about two cups, paired with six cups of hot water and three cups of vinegar. Choosing another conditioner gives the batch a different fragrance without adding another scented product.
Hot Water Goes Into the Bowl First
Six cups of hot water form the base, with tap water used in the original project. Starting with the water leaves room for the thick conditioner to disperse once it goes into the bowl rather than trying to combine the ingredients in a storage bottle.
Hair Conditioner Changes the Mixture
Two cups of conditioner go into the hot water, where the thick green formula begins breaking apart as it is mixed. At first, pieces of conditioner remain visible across the surface, so the two ingredients need to be combined before the vinegar is added.
A larger bowl helps here because the recipe produces far more than a single laundry load. The mixture was whisked until smooth after being transferred into a bowl with enough room to work without spilling over the sides.
Vinegar Goes in After the Conditioner Is Mixed
Three cups of white vinegar are added once the water and conditioner have come together. After another mix, the finished batch is ready to move from the bowl into bottles or jars rather than being made again for every load.
The original project reused a large creamer container as a dispenser and kept part of the mixture in a mason jar in the laundry room. That also makes it possible to make one batch, then pour out a smaller amount when needed.
Changing the Conditioner Changes What’s in the Jar
Kiwi Lime conditioner gives this batch its green tint and scent, but the same idea does not have to stay tied to one fragrance. Switching conditioners offers another way to change the scent, while the source also suggests essential oil as an alternative to the conditioner.
Clover House even changes the tag on the mason jar when the scent changes, turning a basic laundry mixture into something that can be labeled for each batch.
If you made a batch for your laundry room, what scent would you choose—fresh linen, lavender, citrus, vanilla, or something else?
The post Forget Store-Bought Fabric Softener: She Makes Her Own With Something From the Shower appeared first on Homedit.
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