cloth diapers part 1

So far, I am really enjoying cloth diapers. I use them while we are home, during the day. Once I become more comfortable, I would like to use them when we are out during the day. I worry about getting a really messy one while we are out, and trying to find a place to clean it. Night time is another tricky one because Charlotte still eats during the night and has a VERY full diaper when she wakes up in the morning.

I have only had one messy diaper (the others were when we were out), and I didn't know quite what to do with it! I rushed it to the bathroom, and it was liquid, so I wiped off what I could with toilet paper and took all the diapers to the washing machine immediately. That is not what you are supposed to do! But I kind of panicked in the moment! To me, dirty diapers are the difficult thing about cloth diapers. But I think once I get into a system, it will be fine. The liquid will just wash off in the machine and solids can be dumped in the toilet. Some swish the diaper in the toilet water which is tricky for me, we have a duel flush (that only uses 3 L and 6 L) and the water only covers the very bottom of the toilet. There are fancy diaper sprayers which would be perfect for me, but are pretty expensive. I share this not to gross you out, but to be honest about the hard part of cloth diapers... at least in my opinion!

I thought that I would like prefold diapers. Prefolds are one of the simpliest (and cheapest) way to diaper your baby. They look like this:

You can fold them different ways to suit your baby. Click here for some different ways to fold prefolds. You need a cover for these, my favorite so far are the Thirsties covers (www.littletreehugger.ca). Charlotte is in a small size (they run a little big) and it has a trim fit, which I really like. Some people just tuck the prefold into the diaper, but I think that would cause leaks for Charlotte. She still mainly drinks breastmilk and pees quite a bit! So I need something to hold the prefold together, around her body, and THEN put the cover on. The snappi is WONDERFUL for this. I must say, I still have yet to get used to wrapping the prefold and using the snappi. I think once you had a system that worked for you, it would be fine. My favorite diaper so far is the pocket diaper which I will write another post on!!



Charlotte with her Thirsties cover