An experiment
I’ve been trying a few new methods for cleaning that are kinder to the environment and the pocket book. I generally don’t miss the old products, but I do sorely miss the “clean” smell to my laundry with my homemade detergent. I do think it smells a little “fresher” when I use about a 1/2 cup of vinegar in the rinse cycle. But, given that the washer/dryer are in the basement, I rarely happen upon the washer during the rinse cycle. Yes, I can re-run the clothes on only the rinse cycle, but that sort of defeats the water conservation efforts. I’ve had a few friends say they’ve put some essential oils in with the vinegar, but that the dryer seems to remove the lovely smells with the high heat.
Today was finallychangethesheetsalready! day (good luck reading that one!), but the fitted sheet just smelled a little, well, basement-y. Perhaps that week it spent clean, on top of the dryer didn’t help…
So, as an experiment, I put cool water in a simple spray bottle, added about 30 shakes of lavender essential oil, and misted my fitted sheet. I’ll let you know if it helped once it’s dry.
Depeche Mom 
September 16, 2008 at 8:47 am
We made homemade febreeze at MOPS.
1 cup fabric softener
1 cup white vinegar
2 cups water (or more if you want to dilute it more)
you can use whatever scent of fabric softener that you want.
September 22, 2008 at 7:42 pm
i agree with the fresh scent of commercial laundry detergent…i made my own with ivory and made some with irish spring (dh’s fav) but couldn’t smell them…plus he has this weird thing about lots of soap means cleaner clothes…so he was wasting the homemade stuff…so, it’s pre-made stuff for us. as for the vinegar, just put it in the fabric softener well in your machine, the clothes won’t smell at all…i tried it and it works great…but alas, no sweet smell…dh’s can be a bother sometimes!