DIY, Frugal Mom, Liquid Hand Soap & Liquid Body Wash

Step 1 Grate the soap bar

Step 2: Fill a pan with the gallon of water, add Glycerin and soap shavings

Step 3: over Med heat, stir mixture until all soap melts. No need to boil - you are just dissolving completely.

Step 4: Remove from heat and set aside to cool. This can take anywhere  up to 10 hours depending on where you live. Completely cool.

After a few hours it clouds, then it clumps

When it’s completely cooled, check consistency. If too hard, use hand mixer and fluff/mix it, adding small amounts of water until it's the texture you want. (If it really comes out a gelled stringy like consistency- add more water to reduce stringy texture. This happened to me the first time before I understood the glycerine rule with castile soap)

This works great! Fill your old hand soap container, recycle bottles whenever you can. We use this for body wash as well, so I have an old bottle to recycle/reuse for that. The remainder I pour back into the original water gallon jug and label. I keep mine in cool area, the pantry shelf.

(My marker for labeling was being lame, but you still get the idea.)

Wahhh lahhh. Body Wash, and Handsoap, and spare Refill amount for a complete cost of less than $6.00. This lasts us about 4 months (give or take, depending on mud season, or sports etc. and I have a house of all boys!) Saves me approximately $12-20 month.

Note: this recipe does not work well with Dove Soap (too many moisturizers, seem to cause mixture to be too runny and not set up.)  If using dove try to add more soap, like another 1/2 bar grated.

This recipe has not failed me yet,  and we save a small fortune considering body wash is anywhere from $1.99- $5.99 per bottle and Hand soap usually runs $2.99 – to $4.99 a bottle.  The biggest trick for me was finding a soap bar that smelled the way the boys all liked, yet didn't freak out my dry skin. Mrs. Meyer's Soap bar in Basil or Citrus worked great for everyone without complaint.

*Adding a 10 drops of Tea tree oil  to the hand soap bottle and shake, shake, shake makes it antibacterial!

*In winter if bottle is stored where it is extra cold and it gels up harder than expected, give it a seriously good shake! Shake shake shake. LOL nothing's wrong.

* Soap does not create a big lather.

I will not assume to be the originator of this DIY frugal mom idea. Many sites on the internet have this recipe! We have used it now for a year and it really works, especially for larger families who wash hands a lot and can go through the gallon quickly.

I have seen people in blog comments  on sites voice worries over the remaining gallon that's stored molding or going bad, but  -personally- I have NEVER experienced this. My suggestion would be to make 1/2 quantity if you do not think you'll go through the gallon fast enough.

Original idea found on: http://www.thefarmersnest.com/2011/11/liquid-hand-soap-diy.html