Adventures in Diapering

Diapering...the adventure of all new moms!

In our house, we decided to go with cloth diapers - the classic white cloth diapers that you saw in your parents' linen closets - likely being used to dust or wash cars, or in my parents' house, for cleaning the motorcycle :) The cloth has been its own sort of adventure and I thought I would share some thoughts along the way. Please let me know if you have any questions or suggestions or want me to discuss a particular part of cloth diapering. I won't cover everything here, but I'll start by letting you know how we started.

Why cloth?
1) Environmental - disposable diapers take up to 500 years to decompose in landfills - EACH, also, the cloth use less overall plastic. There are some other environmental issues with cloth, so unfortunately, it's not a perfect answer.
2) Reusability
3) Health of the child - no gel or chemicals sometimes found in traditional disposable diapers
4) The adventure - "let's try something different"

I would say the adventure is the biggest part of this. I don't mean to suggest disposables are bad, they are certainly more convenient - we just wanted a bit of an adventure, so on with that.

So, how did we get started? I did some comparison shopping, found the best deal and gave myself $200 spending allowance to buy my first stock. My first order included:

Newborn Prefolds - $14.50 (dozen) x 2 = $29
Infant Prefolds - $16.00 (dozen) = $16
Diaper Covers - $11.25 x 4 = $45
Snappis - $6.50 (3) x 2 = $13*
Liners - $11.60 (200) = $11.60
Waterproof Tote Bags - $7.50 x 2 = $15
Fleece Cover - $17.75 = $17.75**
Tushies Diapers - $13.99 = $13.99
Laundry Detergent - $12.95 x 2 = $25.90

* You only need 1 pack
** I wouldn't buy a fleece cover - haven't used it at all!
So, a bit of explanation.

Prefolds are the classic white diapers you remember from your closets. You should expect to pay about $1.50 per diaper.

Diaper covers. Remember, cloth diapers are cloth so when they're wet, the whole thing is wet. So will baby's clothes and your clothes be instantly wet, unless you use a cover. The covers are remarkably colorful and fun, or very simple white. I try to find them on sale and not spending more than $12 each.

Tushies - these are gel-free and mostly plastic free diapers that take less time to decompose and still avoid chemicals. They are throw-away disposable diapers and we rely on them from time to time - we're not environmentally perfect, just trying to do our part. So this is a pack of 40 diapers for $13.99. More expensive than traditional disposable diapers, but feel a little better for our munchkin.

Innovation in Cloth Diapers
So, talk to you mom about cloth diapers and inevitably you hear about cleaning in the toilet and sticking the baby with pins. Well, for that, we are grateful for innovations.

Liners - $0.06 each (and we cut them in half, so $0.03) each. These are flushable sheets (imagine a dryer sheet). While moisture gets through these, and some yellow color does as well, poop does not! So, take a dirty diaper to the toilet, shake and the liner, poop and all, falls into the toilet. This was a "must have" for Brad. They are also washable, so if they are just wet, we are cleaning them and reusing them too! Honestly, we don't flush after every diaper change - it just reduces a bit more water usage!

Snappis - about $2.25 each. Imagine a butterfly clip (like you used on ace bandages), but put it on a stretchy rubber band. Essentially, it clips from one side, to the other side and then down the center to keep the diaper tight.

I won't suggest cloth is the perfect answer, its been a great decision for us, all I wanted to leave you with is: cloth diapering is really quite fun...and quiet approachable. Check back soon for a bit more explanation on diapers, folding, and laundering.