Make your own laundry soap:

Ingredients:

3.1 oz bar Ivory soap (Ivory is chosen because it's all natural. You may use a soap of your choice)

1 cup 20 Mule Team Borax 

1/2 cup Arm & Hammer Washing Soda

 Water

Tools:

5 Gallon container w/lid (available at many hardware stores - clean)

Knife (for cutting the bar of soap)

Large cooking pot - enough to hold 5 cups of water (you may want to use an old pot)

Long stirring stick/spoon (for 5 gallon container)

Instructions:

Shave the soap into small strips and place in the pot with 5 cups of water. Bring the water just shy of a boil and stir until the soap is completely melted. When the soap is just about melted, pour 3 gallons of hot water into the 5-gallon container and let it sit until the soap in the pot is totally melted. Once all of the soap shavings are melted, pour the mixture into the 5-gallon container and stir.

Once the soap and water are thoroughly stirred, add the ½ cup pf washing soda and stir until dissolved. Once the washing soda is dissolved, pour in the cup of Borax and stir again until dissolved.

Optional: Essential Oils for fragrance. If you like fragrant detergent now is when you can add a few drops of your oil.

Now you've got a huge container of hot soapy looking water. Cover the container, place it somewhere out of the way and let it sit overnight. Once it's cooled it will gel. It will not gel uniformly so it will be lumpy and watery. It may not be very attractive, but it works.

Usage: ½ cup per laundry load is adequate to clean your clothes. This homemade laundry detergent works well in high efficiency washing machines because the suds produced are less than store bought detergents.

Yield:

This recipe yields 442 oz of laundry detergent, of which 4 oz are required per laundry load. With this recipe you should be able to wash 110 ½ loads of laundry.

This should save you lots of dough with this recipe.  I can tell you from personal experience, if you think kids make a lot of laundry, try teenagers. I should know I have 2 of them.