UNDER THE WILLOW SENT ONE OF HER GIFTS

So no, I couldn't take a single picture of Carrie's laundry soap that would do it justice. So I'll just have to convey my excitement and the beauty of her product through words.
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Carrie from Under the Willow Gifts sent me some samples of her natural laundry detergent recently and the only reason I dragged my feet on blogging about it is because I can't take good pictures. Seriously! I always manage to buy the wrong camera... either that or I just have absolutely no talent for taking pictures.

I'll be honest, when I received Carrie's natural laundry soap it looked and smelled fantastic but I doubted its ability to maintain that great scent throughout the washing cycle. I've used natural laundry soaps for years and I've never had any luck getting the scent to stick when I put my clothing in the dryer. When my clothes are hung on the line, they smell wonderful but the dryer sucks every little bit of fragrance right out of the clothes before they finish drying.

When Carrie's package arrived I was eager to use it right away. Sadly, all I had to wash were towels and I always dry towels in the dryer since I haven't found the cure for line drying towels and having them NOT dry crunchy and scratchy (any tips???)

I felt like I was wasting this great product on my towels cause I really wanted the scent to linger after I washed but... I REALLY WANTED to try the laundry soap.

Ah well, life is about sacrifices right?!?

I chose the cambridge rum scent. They all smelled beautiful but cambridge rum is my favorite. My 9 year old was equally as excited as I was, she loves when packages arrive, so she took the first picture of the laundry soap in hand.

Shock #1, when I pulled the towels from the washer they had a beautiful light scent of cambridge rum. I held on to one of the towels for a minute or two because I knew once I tossed them into the dryer that the scent would be gone :( I even hemmed and hawed about possibly just putting them on the line so they'd still smell pretty when they dried but I couldn't stand the idea of drying myself with a hard towel later.

Shock #2, I'd gone out back for something and I could smell the light fragrance of cambridge rum coming from the dryer vent. Wow! I was impressed. It was about 20 minutes into drying time and I could still smell it.

Shock #3, after 40 minutes of drying on low heat I pulled my towels from the dryer. To my surprise they smelled beautiful. The cambridge rum scent hung in there for the long haul. I love that the scent isn't perfumy or overbearing, it was just perfect. I think I talked about it all day long to whomever would listen about how great this natural laundry soap is.

Shock #4, The ultimate shock was how soft the towels felt. Now, I said that my towels are softer when dried in the dryer as oppose to the line but they aren't VERY soft. I don't use fabric softeners so I don't get that fluffy soft that one would get with something like downy. I've tried natural fabric softeners but they don't seem to do much except add a fragrance. My towels felt soft, much softer than they ever were before, which makes for a very happy household because we all love soft things over here.

Of course, I used up all 3 packages of laundry soap samples that day. I decided I needed to wash bed sheets and a few other things. Never have I been so eager to wash. Now at least I know where to buy a laundry soap I can be happy with.

Thank you Carrie for sending me the samples and the beautiful wash cloth. I have the bar of soap sitting on my kitchen sink, we all love washing our hands with it. It has a wonderful fragrance and feels really nice.