Natural Foaming Hand Soap

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Ditch the chemicals and make your own natural foaming hand soap. It’s gentle, moisturizing, and cleans thoroughly without artificial ingredients. Add any scent you like with essential oils!

closeup of woman dispensing foaming hand soap from green ceramic container

Who has walked down the hand soap aisle at Target and been amazed at all the varieties of soap you can buy? I saw Fig & Rhubarb foaming hand soap the other day…wow.

When you buy those fancy brands of soap, you’re getting a lot more than you’ve bargained for. Most–even natural brands like Method–contain artificial colors, preservatives, and sodium chloride. Yes, there is table salt in your liquid soap.

Let’s take a look at this bottle from the Stinky Bath Store.

bath and body soap label

That’s a whole lotta chemicals! And it costs $6.50, to boot. It would cost me $25+ to put a bottle of this at every sink in the house.

With two kids (and their friends) making messes at our house all the time, we have a lot of hands to clean. We don’t use antibacterial soap, and I don’t want to buy soap with weird chemicals in it.

It’s easy to make your own moisturizing foaming soap with three simple ingredients. Let’s do this!

closeup of woman dispensing foaming hand soap from green ceramic container

Ingredients

Purfied or distilled water. Use purified water from your Berkey or buy distilled water. Purified or distilled water won’t have the contaminants, bacteria, pharmaceuticals, lead or other junk that’s in tap water. Yuck.

Vegetable glycerine. Vegetable glycerine is made from plant oils. It’s moisturizing and gives your soap a thick, luxurious feel.

Liquid unscented castile soap. Castile soap is a gentle, plant-based soap that can be used in numerous ways for cleaning.

Foaming hand soap dispenser. These have a special mechanism that turns the liquid into foam. I love this mason jar version!

Essential oil. Essential oils are optional, but are great for scenting your soap and/or giving it antibacterial properties.

Instructions

Measure 2/3 cup distilled water, and pour it into the soap dispenser. If you’re clumsy like me, a funnel will help.

Add 1 teaspoon of vegetable glycerine and 1/3 cup castile soap.

If you’re using essential oils, add 15 drops. You can use a single oil or a combination of oils.

Put the top on the dispenser and gently swirl the ingredients together.

Label the bottle and you’re done! How easy was that?!?


Prefer bar soap? No problem.

Learn how to make natural bar soap without using lye.


Recommended Scents

Kitchen: 10 drops Lemon essential oil, 5 drops Rosemary essential oil

Antibacterial: 12-15 drops On Guard essential oil blend

Sleepytime: 8 drops Lavender essential oil, 4 drops Cedarwood essential oil

Bright & Fresh: 6 drops Peppermint essential oil, 6 drops Wild Orange essential oil

Creamsicle: 12-15 drops Citrus Bliss essential oil blend

Baby’s Bath: 6 drops Lavender essential oil

woman dispensing foaming hand soap from green ceramic container

Natural Foaming Hand Soap

Yield: 8 oz.
Prep Time: 5 minutes
Total Time: 5 minutes
Difficulty: Easy

Ditch the chemicals and make your own natural foaming hand soap. It's gentle, moisturizing, and cleans thoroughly without artificial ingredients.

Materials

  • Purfied or distilled water
  • Vegetable glycerine
  • Liquid unscented castile soap
  • Essential oil (optional)

Tools

  • Foaming hand soap dispenser
  • Funnel

Instructions

  1. Measure 2/3 cup distilled water, and pour it into the soap dispenser.
  2. Add 1 teaspoon of vegetable glycerine and 1/3 cup castile soap.
  3. If you're using essential oils, add 15 drops. You can use a single oil or a combination of oils.
  4. Put the top on the dispenser and gently swirl the ingredients together.

Notes

Recommended Scents:

Kitchen: 10 drops Lemon essential oil, 5 drops Rosemary essential oil

Antibacterial: 12-15 drops On Guard essential oil blend

Sleepytime: 8 drops Lavender essential oil, 4 drops Cedarwood essential oil

Bright & Fresh: 6 drops Peppermint essential oil, 6 drops Wild Orange essential oil

Creamsicle: 12-15 drops Citrus Bliss essential oil blend

Baby's Bath: 6 drops Lavender essential oil

Recommended Products

As an Amazon Associate and member of other affiliate programs, I earn from qualifying purchases.

P.S. If my comment above makes you wonder what’s in your tap water, check out EWG’s Tap Water Database. Type in your zip code to find out what’s in your water…and you’ll see why we have a Berkey water purifier.

Read more about Homemade Soap

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Hi, Im Pam!

I created Brown Thumb Mama to share my natural living journey, and help you live a greener life. Thanks for being here!

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