Cleaning again, this time the dishes

So as with the laundry, I wanted to find a gentler way to do the dishes than using bottles and bottles of chemical dish washing soap.  I found a few sites that had the same recipe:

• 1 cup baking soda or washing soda
• 1 cup borax
• 1/2 cup salt
• 1/2 cup citric acid

Mix together. Use 1 Tablespoon per load. You can add vinegar to the rinse aid dispenser to help with the cloudiness.

My borax was kinda chunky and it took a long time to break up all the chunks once it was all mixed together.  Next time I would put it through a sieve as you would with baking flower. 

All the ingredients were quite inexpensive.  I live in a small town and can't get them at my local grocer but I was able to order it though one of my favorite sites www.well.ca .  The citric acid was about 8 dollars and it took the whole container for the recipe, next batch I make will be with out it, I have seen some recipes without it and I am hoping I wont see the difference with out it.  I will keep you posted.

As for its storage, originally I was going to put it into a gar but that does not seem practical because it is hard to spoon it out.  As you can see in the photo I opted  for a Tupperware, and though it is easy to access I am still not thrilled with it.  So the final solution is going to be using an old liquid laundry detergent bottle.  It has a wide opening and the powder should flow easily.  First I have to wait to finish one of the 7 bottles filled with my homemade detergent.

As with the laundry soap situation:

Recycled Content:

The boxes the ingredients come in are recyclable.

We are reusing containers that would otherwise go to be recycled.

VOC/ Chemical free:
The ingredients for this recipe are chemicals, yes, but they are natural to the environment and biodegradable. These chemicals are not man made and have a natural place on the planet. Eco-pioneer products are even packaged in recyclable or compostable packaging and printed with vegetable inks. We buy ours through well.ca, free delivery.

Reduce construction and living waste:
The containers for the ingredients coming into the house are recyclable or compostable so there is no waste being created. The storage containers are old detergent bottles which are being reused.

So I did a load as soon as it was made and I am quite happy with the results.