We decided very early on to go cloth with our baby bee. Between the two of us S and I have changed maybe a dozen diapers in our lives, so we're starting from scratch here. Why not go for the more cost conscious option? And I work from an office in our home, so taking five minutes to put on a load of laundry every few days is really not a hardship. Plus, I love laundry. Love it.
I spent much of the summer researching cloth diapers, how to wash them, their pros and cons and preferred brands for different stages in a baby's pre-potty trained life. I chose a half dozen or so brands and sought out sales on deal-a-day sites and found excellent deals on "used" diapers returned perfectly clean and barely used from sites that offer 21-day trials. A washing and a few hours on the line in the sun removed any sign that the diapers were ever used, even on the ones sold in "fair" condition. We intend on re-selling any of the diapers that don't quite work with our baby's physique since some brands are apparently better for chunkier v. slimmer babies.
We weighed the pros and cons of using disposables until baby fits into one-sized diapers, but because of the 21-day "used" diapers, it was more cost effective to go for cloth right from the start (minus the first week or two of tough-to-clean diapers). So we bought diapers for both the newborn and one-sized-fits-most stages. We should have enough of the latter to do laundry every three days and every other day during the newborn months.
Our diapers are all prepped, organized in the dresser and ready for baby bee's arrival. Newborn suitable on top and 12+ pounds on bottom:
Because we'll have three adults in the house when baby arrives and only one of those adults did all the research on cloth, and because that adult will be responsible for all the feedings and will not be responsible for the changings too, I used the label maker to avoid mistakes like "no I didn't use a cover with that diaper" when asked why the cradle is soaked, for example. In addition to "needs cover" and "doesn't need cover" there are also little hints like "always use liners with rash cream" - even though we bought a cloth safe diaper rash cream.
We've had several lessons with Mr. Bear using a few of the newborn suitable brands like the Thirsties duo wraps, Kissaluvs, prefolds and Fuzzibunz and I have to say, as with everything else around here, S is ready for the challenge; how hard can it be?
My mom, on the other hand, is going to learn on the fly...but this whole baby thing is like riding a bike, right? It comes right back after 30-some-odd-years, right?Labels: baby, cloth diapers, nursery
