Why do I have Foil Balls in my Dryer?

Due to financial concerns, several months ago I started making my own laundry detergent. I received the recipe in a Relief Society meeting, and next time I ran out of laundry detergent, instead of buying more, I purchased the ingredients for the homemade stuff, which all together, was cheaper.

What's the recipe? Well, it is posted in several places on the internet so I don't know who to credit with coming up with it, but here it is:

1/2 C. Washing Soda (It's like baking soda, but I found it in the laundry aisle at WalMart.)
1/2 C. Borax (I actually already had this at home because it really helps when trying to get out ink stains.)
1/3 Bar of Fels-Naptha Soap. (This is good laundry soap, other recipes suggest Ivory, or other types of soap.)

Grate the soap. Heat 6 C. water and then add the grated soap and stir until the soap is melted. Add the washing soda and Borax, then stir until the powder is dissolved. Remove from heat. (One recipe I found suggested letting the mixture boil for 15 minutes. I tried it once, but like milk, it boiled over suddenly if I wasn't watching constantly. In the end it looked and acted the same as non-boiled did, so I think that step was more trouble than it was worth.)

In a clean 2 gallon container, pour 4 cups of hot water, add the heated soap mixture, then add 18 more cups of cold water. (I'm not sure why the sequence of hot to cold.) Cover and let sit for 24 hours before using. Shake or stir before each use because it kind of gels. I use about 1/2 c. per load, and each batch lasts me about a month and a half. 

I also came across a recipe for powdered detergent, using 1 cup each Washing Soda and Borax and a whole bar of grated soap, mixing it together and using 1-2 T. per load. I might try that next time I run out, but something I read suggested that it might not dissolve as well in cold water so that is something to think about. Either way, it is supposed to work fine for HE washers too.

I've made it six times now, and gone through 2 bars of soap, but since each bar only costs about $1, and I can get many batches out of the same boxes of washing soda and Borax, which are less than $5 dollars each, this is much more economical for me than buying pre-made laundry detergent.

So what does this have to do with foil in the dryer? Well, as I was making my 6th batch on Monday, I was thinking about homemade recipes for household things, and wondered if there was a homemade recipe for dryer sheets.

If you read this blog regularly, you'll remember that I recently got a new dryer. Before this, I was drying (or trying to dry) my clothes on a clothesline as much as possible, so static cling wasn't a big deal, so when I ran out of dryer sheets I didn't feel the need to replace them. Now, my dryer works wonderfully well at drying my clothes, but I was finding my nylon stockings stuck inside my boys' sleepers, and trying to walk with my dress clinging to my legs. I could have bought more dryer sheets, but when I learned that they work by coating clothes with a waxy substance, that also affects the dryer filters, I wondered if there was something else that would be as effective. One easy suggestion was putting balls of aluminum foil into the dryer with the clothes. They were supposed to attract the extra electrons or something. All I know is that I've been using them this week - for every thing from jeans and T-shirts to sheets and towels and they seem to work. No more static! They are supposed to last for a long time - and when they loose their effectiveness, they say that you can just add another layer of foil to the outside. I'll be interested to see how long they really do last. I may never get dryer sheets again.