Wash your hands

Harder than it sounds when you have to carry your own soap…. PEG is in almost every hand soap on the market.

I first tried a version of foaming soap that included additional oils for moisture (I used sweet almond oil or fractionated coconut oil), but I found it required the soap to be shaken up before use, AND it reversed part of the soap making process, saponification. The excess fatty oils changed the chemical balance of the soap – and while I don’t know much of the chemistry, it did make me question if the soap was still doing what I needed. During a pandemic, I want to be sure my soap is cleaning at full strength.

Because there are 12 million soap recipes on the internet, I’m posting mine here so I can find it again later!

In a foaming soap container, add 3 parts distilled water and 1 part Dr. Bronner’s liquid Castile soap.

That’s the whole thing. That’s the ratio I use.

This works in any size container with a bit of simple math. The foaming dispenser makes it hard to use too much soap, which is really what dries my hands. Depending on the season, I don’t even need lotion afterwards, so the extra oils (and extra money for those oils) were just wasted!

It’s super economical, too, at less than $2 per refill. That foaming dispenser will be able to be refilled many times before it needs replacing, so this is all much more environmentally friendly than buying a new pump at the store every month or so.

You can use whatever scent you like; I really like that Dr. Bronner’s uses all natural essential oils for their scents. I like peppermint for the kitchen, and the almond for any and everywhere. The unscented soap has no EOs and is great for sensitive skin or surfaces that won’t tolerate EOs. I even use the unscented foaming soap to cleanse my reusable menstrual products! Works as well as the product-specific soap, with no chemicals, and at a fraction of the cost and environmental impact.

It’s important to use distilled water – especially if your tap water is hard. The minerals in the water will cloud the soap as they bond with the Castile soap. Also, this avoids the potential for any living bacteria or viruses living in your tap water from making their way into your soap. Ew.

Simple. Limited ingredients. Affordable. Clean.