Homemade Dishwasher Detergent - UPDATE

Although I was very satisfied how well my homemade dishwasher detergent cleaned my dishes, I was quite disappointed how MUCH it clumped just in one day.  Apparently the rice trick does not work.  See:

This is my container upside down.

This morning I decided to declump (yes i know, that's not really a word) the detergent.  It took me a while to get out into a bowl.  It kind of looks like feta cheese doesn't it?  I assure you it's not.  

As I was breaking up all the clumps I got to wondering if I could just turn it into a liquid dishwasher detergent.  I first looked online to see if other people had tried this and though I did find very few recipes for a liquid version none of them had the same ingredients that I had used in my dry version.  So I scooped out 1/4 cup of it into another bowl.  And taking the logic that when making liquid laundry detergent you dissolve all the ingredients into hot water I tried that.  I didn't want to make a huge batch at first in fear that it did not work so using my Keurig coffee maker I put a 1 cup measuring cup underneath it and hit the largest setting.  I got over a cup.  I slowly poured water into the bowl.  Woah! It fizzed and bubble super quick, so quick I couldn't get a picture.  It was quite watery.  So I added another 1/4 cup.  Same thing, fizzed and bubbled.  (I determined I added approximately 1/4 cup water)  As I stirred it I thought it would be a flop because it was so watery.  I set it aside because my littlest midget needed attending to, go figure.  I kept looking at the detergent and stirring it. It was getting thicker, and thicker, more like the liquid detergent you buy in the store.  Hmm, it might just work after all!  Sadly though I had run the dishwasher first thing when I got up so I cannot try it out yet.

This is shortly after I mixed the detergent and water.

Hard to see how thin it is here.

Thicker still.

Getting thicker.

And thicker still.

After it got thick I poured it, well spooned it into an empty Karo syrup bottle I had.  It thought it would be perfect since it had a somewhat large opening to squeeze out.  If this works and I do it again, I will pour it into the bottle before it thickens up.

Now you'll just have to wait for me to dirty up some dishes to find out the results!

EDIT: After I got done typing all this I checked the bottle and it had thickened up so much that it would come out.  So I added another 1/4 cup water.  Too thin again and never really thickened.   I ended up adding a tablespoon of detergent at a time, I think I added 3 more tbsp. to it and it seemed the right consistency I was going for.  It coats the bottle when I swirl it around.  I was able to fill up my dishwasher enough to test it out and it's currently running with one formula scoop worth.  I'll check back in later for final results!