Squeaky Clean

I have connections...in the soap business. My brother knows someone who gets free sample products from one of those major beauty/food products manufacturers. These aren't the tiny sample bottles either- they are Sam's Club sized gallons of shampoos, soaps, mayo... you name it! So every couple of months we are being pleasantly surprised by random tubs of beauty products and fooding stuffs; one month we may get 10 sets of shampoos, the next month bars of soap and granola bars. My sister has donated much of her freebees (hotel shampoos and these gifts) to the local women's shelter as well. Whatever we can't use, someone can.

Seeing the 30 bars of brand-named soap on my shelf next to the 18 partially used hand soaps from all the hotels I've stayed at - I can't clean enough to use them all! But I decided to try my hand and turn some of those soaps into liquid hand soaps - something we were running low on - and without the additional chemical additives! Here's the play-by-play:


1: Heat 1 gallon of previously boiled or distilled water until its just steamy.

2: Shave 1 bar of soap until its nice and thin.

3: Add soap to steamy water, remove from heat, blend. Let sit for a few hours and make sure its well blended. 4: Funnel into soap containers.

Technically this can also be used in place of body wash (since they are effectively the same thing) but with out the $12 price tag. So one bar of free soap just saved me $12 any way I use it. It only took 15 minutes to make the soap (without the time to wait for it to sit!). It came out a bit liquid this time, next time I'll use a smidge less water.