Cloth Diapering: How It's Going

You may remember way back when, my husband and I were considering doing cloth diapering. Well...we bit the bullet and jumped on the cloth diaper bandwagon, and I figured it was high time to report back on how it's going! Since our daughter's birth, we've been doing cloth diapers almost exclusively, and with great success! Our current stash is a hodgepode of cloth diapers.  Some I registered for on Amazon, others I picked up via zulily deals, and many I bought on consignment through local moms groups and craigslist, and finally the rest I purchased new.

For the first month to 6 weeks, we exclusively diapered using size 1 cotton prefolds, held on with a Snappi, underneath Thirsties Duo Wrap waterproof covers.  At this point, she was starting to outgrow size 1 prefold diapers, so we began using size 2 prefolds with the same waterproof covers, and started using some AIO (all in one) diapers. For you cloth diaper newbies, AIOs are basically a diaper cover that's fleece lined that you stuff with an insert (which resembles a cotton maxi pad).  These are designed to wick away the moisture from the baby, so when she pees, the wetness goes through the fleece layer, and soaks the cotton insert, keeping the baby feeling dry.  Then, you can reuse the cover if the baby just pees (just restuffing it with a new insert),  and if they poop,  you have to wash the whole thing.  

At about 6 weeks, we began adding in the following diapers - a combination of AIO’s (all-in-ones), waterproof covers, and cloth inserts.

- 7 Bum Genius 4.0 AIO diapers with inserts

- 4 Lotus Bumz diapers with inserts

- 1 Little Monsters cloth diapers

- 2 Flip diapers covers with inserts

- 6 GroVia shells with 6 Stay Dry Soaker pads

My favorites so far are BumGenius 4.0 and GroVia diapers.  I enjoy GroVia’s, (though the most expensive of our lot) because they have a convenient snap-in system, inserts snap into place, and can be easily removed and replaced. These diapers are extremely absorbent and suitable for nighttime wear.  BumGenius 4.0 I also really like, the fleece lining is soft, and wicks moisture away easily, keeping baby happy and dry.  We've had several wet leaks with the few Lotus Bumz and Little Monsters diapers we have, so those are always the last ones I use before doing laundry.  To date, we’ve had zero blow outs.  Zero!  And I'm told that's something to be proud of! There’s something to be said about a diaper cover, it holds all the mess in!

Once she has dirtied a diaper, we place said diaper in a waterproof wet bag.  These wetbags are our brilliant, by far my favorite kind! They zip closed and contain not only the messy diaper, but the smell as well!  Luckily, we haven’t had any problems with diaper odors infiltrating her nursery.  Once the wet bag is full of dirty diapers, it’s time to do laundry!  We keep 2-3 wetbags on hand (one extra is intended for day care), and alternate, so when one is being laundered, there are typically 1-2 others to contain any new dirty diapers.

Many people are discouraged from this form of cloth diapering due to the fact that you must launder the diapers yourselves. And while I’m only about 3 months in, I can say, it’s really not that bad.  Honestly!  We do laundry roughly every other day, sometimes every 3 days.  At this stage, she’s exclusively breastfeeding, and breastfed poo is more liquidy to begin with.  Translation, it washes off fairly easily.  We had been washing her diapers in our utility sink in our basement, where we pre-wash the diapers, rinsing off any solids, before a hot rinse in the washing machine, followed by a wash cycle using this cloth diaper detergent (cloth diaper detergents are recommended to preserve the life of the diapers and prevent any detergent residue build up).

For the skeptics, I'm here to tell you it can work. Will you spend more money upfront? Yes. Will you do more laundry? Yes. But is it worth it? In my opinion, a thousand times yes. We have bought maybe 5 packages of disposable diapers in 3 months. And at $9.99 - $24.99 a pop, those boxes aren't cheap! We still use disposables when traveling, to avoid doing laundry on the road, but I'm sure if you were really committed you could easily continue the cloth habit while on the move. So while our investment into cloth diapering was up front, I'm confident we will save hundreds, even thousands of dollars as our daughter grows, and ideally be able to use the diapers again when we decide to have more kids.

I'm a big advocate of this system, and believe it can work for your family, with a little research, preparation, and the stamina to follow through. If you have any queries, I'd be happy to answer questions or provide any insight from my own experience; email me at lovelylittlethingsblog {at} gmail {dot} com.

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