Feb 14 / Erin

From the bottom of our…bottom

It’s Valentine’s Day, people, so let’s talk about something I love: our cloth diapers. Okay, love might be a strong word. But, know what I do love? Walking by the diaper section at the store and smiling to myself about the money we’re saving. Truth be told, our decision to cloth diaper is not about saving the earth one diaper at a time. Nope. It has to do more with cold, hard cash. I’m kind of cheap like that. And if I save the world in the meantime, bonus points for me.

A few of you have asked me about our choice of diapers and the process we use, so I thought I would share it here. If there is continued interest, I’d be happy to update you all on how our diaper decision is working as our little guy grows.

We chose the BumGenius 4.0 One-Size diapers with snaps. These are basically designed to fit babies from birth until they are ready to say buh-bye to diapers, but our little guy didn’t fit into them until he was about 3 weeks old (at about 8 pounds). It worked out for the best, anyway. Bringing home a new baby was enough work; I’m not sure if I could have managed the added thought process necessary for washing diapers in those first few weeks. But by four weeks, we were pros at snapping those babies on the baby.

Once the diapers are prepped, they are just as easy to put on as disposable diapers. It does take some extra work to prep the diapers after washing, though, and it takes all I have not to procrastinate on stuffing the diapers. Wonder what I mean by stuffing?

Well, each of the diapers come with the outside cover, a newborn insert and a one-size insert. Ike was using the newborn inserts for only a week or so before I switched to the bigger, more absorbent inserts…he was soaking those newborn inserts like it was his job. Once the diapers are washed, you just stuff the inserts into the covers and you’re good to go. It gets easier and faster with practice. Frankie likes to help.

I know, I’m making this look way too easy and glamorous. These are diapers, after all, and they do get dirty.

To combat the poo, we use the BumGenius Diaper Sprayer, which is conveniently hooked up to our toilet. Chris installed this in less than 30 minutes, so it was easy to do. Next to the toilet we have our handy-dandy wet/dry pail. This means that we rinse the diaper covers and inserts and then pop them into the generic plastic trash can, which is lined by a waterproof diaper pail liner (the diaper is wet and the pail is dry, hence the wet/dry pail method).

I’ve been following the manufacturer’s directions when washing and so far so good. Every day or every other day, I do a load of diapers. I wash them in cold first, then in hot with a very small amount of Tide Free and Gentle powder detergent. Wishful thinking had me hoping that this process would completely remove the orangey poo color each time, but some staining does occur.

The inside of the cover cleans up really well, with barely any sign of stains.

The inserts are more absorbent and pick up the stains a bit more, as you might be able to see here.

The directions say to put inserts in the sun to help remove stains. But here I sit sunless in the dead of Maine winter, so we’ll have to wait until summer to see if that works. Fingers crossed.

In the interest of full disclosure, I have to admit that we do use disposables mixed in. We were realistic about this and knew we couldn’t go totally cloth. Disposables are super handy when traveling and I’ve been using them at night most of the time…mostly out of laziness and not wanting to worry about rinsing off a diaper in my half-asleep state. We were lucky enough to have two big diaper cakes made for us for showers, so I have a big stock of disposables on hand. I’m sure that as those run out I’ll be leaning more towards our cloth stash for night time. We also feel fortunate that the child care we’ve selected is willing to try our cloth diapers out, so we should be able to continue limiting our disposable purchases going forward.

Oh, and I had the best intentions to use cloth wipes, as well, and even got these great organic ones as a gift. But, there is something about having to go to the bathroom to wet them before changing the diaper that adds just one too many steps. So far they’ve mostly been used as washcloths at bath time!

So, that is where we currently stand on cloth diapering. I’m happy with our choice so far and I am excited to see how they work.

If you’re considering cloth diapering or decide to do so, my biggest piece of advice is to tell people about it. While cloth diapers save you a bundle in the long run, you can save even more if you receive your diapers as gifts. I found a lot of people weren’t aware of the cloth diaper options that are out there these days (some people still picture old-school cloth diapers and pins). I know, diapers aren’t really a glamorous gift, but if people know how much you want/need them, they will be more likely to purchase them for you.

Okay, so what did I leave out? Any questions for the self-proclaimed cloth diapering queen? Send ‘em my way!