Thrifty Thursday - Homemade Dryer Sheets

Earlier this week, while doing laundry, I used my very last dryer sheet. I walked over to the fridge, pen in hand, to add dryer sheets to the grocery list when from no where, a magnificent thought crossed my mind. (Magnificent thoughts don't cross my mind very often so I have to get excited when they do). Are you thinking what I'm thinking? I feel a ThRiFtY tHuRsDaY coming on!

I seemed to remember some DIY laundry tips on Gayle's Grocery Cart Challenge so I headed back over to check it out. Sure enough, there was a link to laundry tips and there I found the instructions for making your own dryer sheets. You can click here to see her post.

So, I set out on a mission today. Here's what you need:


2 cups of water
1 cup vinegar
2/3 cup hair conditioner
A margarine container (or other comparable bucket type thingy)
A spoon (or whisk)
A rag (I'm suggesting one that's on the clean-ish side)

This is so simple. All you have to do is mix all the ingredients together and stir. Do not shake (I didn't try this because Gayle warned shaking would cause the mixture to foam). I used a whisk to stir it so that I could get the conditioner to break down and mix in. This caused a bit of foaming, hopefully not too much. After mixing it together, you just store it in a container with a rag and when you are doing laundry, you soak the rang, wring it out and put it in the dryer with your clothes. I won't be doing laundry again until Monday so I will update you next week as to how I think they are working out.

This is a very cost effective method. For me, it was basically free, I think. I used up a bottle of conditioner that has been in my cupboard since the Ice Age along with a few bottles of sample size conditioner that I have accumulated over time (HINT: STEALING FROM HOTELS WILL LOWER THE COST OF YOUR HOMEMADE DRYER SHEETS). As far as the vinegar is concerned, I'm assuming one cup costs about 17 cents (based on 2.99 for a gallon and one gallon = 16.65 cups). Okay, I could be way off on this ... maybe it's more like 19 cents?

Anyway, you get the point. It cost me less than 25 cents to make a batch of homemade dryer sheets. I am not sure how many loads this will do, but I will let you know once I have experimented and figured that out. Gayle also suggested that this mixture can be used as liquid fabric softener. I don't generally use fabric softener, but if I like the way this works, I just might start.

I'm so excited about this I just might go make some clothes dirty just so I can try it out. Happy Thrifty Thursday!