Project: Earth Week . Cloth Diaper Report (the conclusion)

Back when Zadie was tiny Baby Lemon, I wrote a couple of posts on our experiences with cloth diapers. You can read my posts on cloth diapering a newborn: part 1 here, and part 2 here. I also wrote a guest post over at Surely You Nest on switching to cloth for a toddler. It's been a long time since then and I feel that we have it figured out.

We currently use a mix of pocket diapers and fitteds with covers. I was hesitant at first to try Goodmama diapers but I gave in to a print with rainbows and clouds and was immediately sold. And for good reason. These diapers are hard to beat. We have a heavy wetter here so we need something super absorbent. These last about 3 hours. Some people go coverless but I think they must not have rugs or furniture. We still love Thirsties covers.

We also have a few pocket diapers. Mostly we use the BumGenius brand stuffed with one of the microfiber inserts sold with the diapers and another hemp insert. We have a few Thirsties AIOs as well. These have the microfiber built in to a pocket system. They are surprisingly trim and we still add a hemp insert. The only downside to the Thirsties is that they take a long time to dry.

While the Goodmamas show absolutely no sign of wearing out, I don't see the BumGenius diapers lasting through another 2 years with a second kid (no this is not a hint. I am not, nor do I intend to become, pregnant anytime soon). The velcro is starting to pull off most of the Thirsties AIOs and we've already replaced the covers once. Always a sucker for something new, I bought the BumGenius flip system to try out and I didn't really like it.

We still hang our diapers on the line every chance we get. The sun bleaches out the stains and keeps everything so much nicer. The Goodmamas have been in the drier many times and it doesn't seem to bother them. We always hang the pockets and the covers.

At night and when we are going out for long periods of time, we use the Seventh Generation diapers. We could not get anything to work for nights. I wish I would have believed my friend when she told me not to mess with it. But I'm all type A and had to see for myself. I wasted a LOT of money on pricey inserts. A LOT. We go through a pack of diapers every 3 weeks (more if we travel). We are still using the same wetbags I bought when I was pregnant and even the same bags for the dirty diapers. While I will keep the wetbags because they are still in great shape, I can't wait to toss the laundry bags in the trash. They are spent but I know we're almost done with this. Welcome pullups! There is nothing more green than potty training.

So there you have it. This is what works for us. Every baby is different and every kid has a different body. It does take a little bit of experimenting to figure out what is going to work for you.

And we still love our changing table (above). Check out the monkey cup cozy! I love it. It's concealing a Mason jar of diaper dust. Mr. Lemon just punched a bunch of holes in the top with a hammer and nail. More on the cup cozy tomorrow when I'll be announcing two sponsors.

Don't forget to check out Sabra's Cloth Diapering 101 over at Sew a Straight Line. Tomorrow she will be writing a tutorial on sewing your own cloth diapers (really amazing if you have the time). I will be posting a tutorial on making your own cloth wipes and sharing my secret wipes solution recipe.

Guest post over at Surely You Nest

I'm certain that the best thing about Etsy is the people you "meet." Long ago (last summer) MamaBird was one of my custom yeti customers at my Etsy shop. This year she ordered some more. We got to talking (online -- I guess you call it email but you know) and realized we had lots of stuff in common. She asked me if it was too late to switch to cloth diapers with her 21-month old son. I thought that others might be interested in the same info so it's been blogged (and that may very well be my first use of that word as a verb).

It was fun to research and revisiting some of the facts reinforced Team Lemon's decision to go cloth although cost has been moved down toward the bottom of the list...

Check out the full post at Surely You Nest.

The Cloth Diaper Report . part two (newborn)

the prefolds and some lap pads hanging on the line

The Reviews.

I had originally made this one long post but decided to break it into two. But first, I wanted to add that I got a lot of information from asking questions and reading reviews on the Diaper Pin. It's a forum with really helpful people who are all doing the cloth diaper thing.

So anyway, here's a rundown of what I bought and how it worked:

Covers.
Love love love the Thirsties covers. They come in great colors and fit her fabulously. The XS still fits and she is already wearing the S. Never had a leak. We already bought a medium to use later.

Hate the Proraps. The newborn size we got was stiff and never really loosened up. It is minty green. She has already grown out of it and the S is still too big. These just don't work for us.

(Both of these companies have mixed reviews online. It seems that some people like the Thirsties and some people like the Proraps. It might be best to buy one of each and test them both. Every baby has a different shape.)

I LOVE my Geny cover. It looks huge but has a surprisingly snug fit. I bought this from her Etsy shop (escidus.etsy.com). She has grown her business since then and now offers a more trim diaper in her off-Etsy website.

Diapers.
Hate the Thirsties "fab" fitted (my quotes). This diaper is a joke. It is not at all absorbent. As I mentioned before, we are using these next to the baby's skin so she doesn't feel wet. We have to pad it with a prefold or a soaker to actually absorb the wetness.

I bought a Kissaluvs fitted, two Loveybums, and one Dream-Eze fitted. These are all great -- very absorbent and relatively quick to dry. The only problem is that with a small baby, you get a very large bottom. I think that once she's bigger and we're on the last snaps, it will be much better. The good side to this is that we have four diapers that are going to fit for a long time. The Kissaluvs is the only one that doesn't have a snap-in soaker so it takes the longest to dry. It's good to have a couple of fitteds on hand for those days when you just don't feel like folding up the prefold and dealing with the Snappis.

Pocket Diapers.
The Happy Heinys pocket diaper is already getting small so we have bought a couple of M sizes. They do not come with inserts so you'll need to buy them separately. These fit our baby really well and are nice and thin. Now that we have a couple of mediums, we'll be using them during the day with just one soaker.

I have bought a couple of BumGenius diapers and my friend Joy who gave us all the newborn covers also gave us a bunch of different types of diapers to try. Of course, I bought some diapers from Etsy sellers. I already mentioned by Geny cover but I also picked up some AIOs (all in ones -- these are just like disposables but you wash them). They are still too big so they will be covered in part three.

I was thinking AIOs would be great for day trips and going to the Grandmas. Surprisingly, both Grandmas were fine with the prefolds and picked up the bikini twist like champs. We also don't have a problem changing the prefolds while out of the house. I bought a couple of small wetbags that fit in the diaper bag (these I just wash with my regular laundry) and we're good to go.

The Cloth Diaper Report . part one (newborn)

sleepy baby lemon in a diaper i made

I spent weeks researching cloth diapers before Baby Lemon arrived and despite all the work, I still ended up making some mistakes. So I decided to write up a post for all the people who are research obsessed like me. You can take my advice and buy what I think worked best.

Since I sew, I came to the decision to use fitted diapers with covers for the tiny baby stage. I love to sew but I don't like too much of a challenge so I didn't want to deal with the PUL (that's the waterproof stuff they make covers and wetbags out of). I can sew a fitted diaper for about 2$ (maybe less, I didn't really do the math). You can buy fitted diapers from $16 - $24. Time is money but since I'm on maternity leave, I got plenty of it.

But who wants to sew diapers when you have a wailing infant? (So more on fitteds with part three.)

We started with a set of unbleached newborn size prefold diapers and 9 covers. People will tell you that you need 4 - 6 covers but I think more is better. Your baby will be able to wear the covers for long after they're out of the newborn size prefolds so they have a lot of staying power (and so does the smell of hot pee so you really want to wash these every other diaper cycle). We use the bikini twist and it has kept in most poonamis.

You'll need about 4 Snappis as well. They are these little plastic thingys that are pretty cheap and much easier than pins. If your newborn is sedate, go for pins if you dare. My baby is Ms. Squirmalin so we "stick" with what's fastest. We keep a couple of the Snappis by the changing table and a couple with the pack n play.

I got several covers from a friend of mine but they're really inexpensive. I paid just over $1 each for the prefolds and washed them 6 times (hot/hot in the wash with a hot temp in the dryer -- that's called "prepping"). The covers I pre-washed just once because I always wash everything that goes on the baby's soft sensitive skin.

I alternated a pinch of Dawn dishwashing liquid with some eco-friendly Planet detergent we were able to find here at our Kroger. Now we just use the Planet for every wash. If your diapers start to become less absorbent, it's time to use the Dawn for a cycle or two to strip the dipes of any residue that's caused the situation.

I also bought 24 unbleached infant size prefolds. (I actually bought a mix of Indian and Chinese prefolds to see what was best and I can't even tell them apart now. They are equal). We used the newborn size during the day and the infant size at night. The infant size is a lot bigger and more absorbent. At 9 weeks, she has long outgrown the newborn dipes but still fits into the infant sizes. Our baby usually cries within seconds of wetting her diaper so we change often.

This situation lasted great for a few weeks. Then she started wanting to sleep longer at night but was waking up because she could feel the wetness -- not because she was hungry. We changed our plan of attack. In my pregnant crazy state I bought a wide variety of diapers and this is when they came in handy. We have two scenarios that work for us: 1. a Happy Heinys pocket diaper (size S) stuffed with one soaker insert and one folded up prefold and 2. a Thirsties "fab" fitted with a prefold folded up behind it (not inside it) and all wrapped up in a cover. These worked well because the layers touching the baby are synthetic fabrics so they wicked away the wetness from the baby and she felt dry. We are still using this method and the baby is now sleeping almost 8 hours a night before she wakes up. It's heaven.

Best of all: the diaper in the picture! It's the one that I made. It has a cotton velour inner layer that touches the baby so she doesn't feel dry (it's 80% cotton). The outside is two layers of flannel (an ugly one that no one sees and the cute outer print). It has a pocket for the soaker inserts. I'm making those too (they're cut but not stitched yet). I have no plans to sell these in the shop. I used a free pattern I got online and it fits perfectly and will fit for some time. It does require a cover. It's actually quite wet in this picture (on a very sleepy baby just waking up!).

I'll write up another post in a couple of weeks once we get into a new routine. We're still sticking mainly with the prefolds and covers at 9 weeks.

We have enough diapers now that we only do laundry every other day. Our washing machine has a water level setting so we only use what we need and we hang everything out on the line to dry. When it's raining, we use a drying rack in the basement.