cloth diapers

This is not a real blog post, just a short explanation for those who are curious about how we're doing cloth diapers.  I'm a big fan of the system we're using, especially after it contained an epic poo yesterday.  I'm serious.  This was the kind of poo that, once the diaper was opened, the entire area was immediately contaminated and there was nothing to do but strip everything off the baby and changing table and hose it down!
Anyway, we're using probably the most economical cloth diaper method which is prefold diapers in combination with waterproof covers.  I bought the entire stash we're using now for $40 on craigslist.  That's about 36 diapers and 4 covers of each size.  At home, we also use handmade flannel babywipes with homemade wipe solution in a spray bottle.  We still occasionally use disposable diapers when we go out or when we get behind in laundry.  They are faster and easier to put on, but they also leak more often.





So here's what we need to diaper the baby- a prefold diaper, a snappi to get the diaper on snugly, and a diaper cover.

And here's the stack of wipes and spray bottle.  The recipe we use for the wipe spray has water, olive oil, baby soap, tea tree oil, and lavender essential oil.  The tea tree and lavender oil have natural antiseptic qualities.  For the wipes, I cut out 50 or so squares of flannel and zigzag stitched the edges.






After wiping the baby and removing the old diaper to the diaper bin, we fold or roll the section of diaper that goes through the baby's legs, pull it up in the front, and attach it with the snappi.  Here's what it looks like: 

Then, wait 30 seconds so that the baby can immediately wet the new diaper and you can repeat the last steps.  Oh wait, maybe that's just my baby.  Moving along!  We cover the diaper and snappi with the waterproof cover which attaches with velcro and we're done.  What a happy diapered baby!

The dirty diapers and wipes sit in the reusable diaper bag.  We wash them every other day with a special detergent.  They come out nice and clean and our washing machine isn't icky. 

Baby brags- 4 weeks

 Colin is four weeks old!  We have kept him alive- and happy even!  He is very big for his age, in 95th percentile in weight and height at his 2 week appointment.  He's grown out of all the newborn clothes and some of the 3 month clothes too, so you could say nursing is going well.  The other night he slept for four hours straight and has been getting better about sleeping more at night than in the daytime thanks in part to swaddling.  I think we're doing pretty well as parents too.  We haven't dropped him or forgotten him anywhere and have managed to take him out to two Halloween parties and a few stores.  I'm going to try to take him to the grocery store for the first time this weekend.  Fingers crossed that he doesn't get hungry or upset in the store. 





Cloth diapering has been going better than expected.  It takes a little bit longer to put on the prefold and then the diaper cover, but they work much better than disposables in containing blowouts- so I'd say it's worth spending the time upfront to prevent having to wash the poop out of MY clothes.  We have to wash the diapers about every other day, but they come out nice and clean and don't require any special treatment since breastfed baby poops wash out really easily.  Plus we're saving soo much money.  One of Colin's favorite tricks is to mess up a new diaper before you even leave the changing table!

Robert has gone back to working normal hours at the ministry house and I'm very happy to be able to spend this time at home with my little one. We get excited about each little milestone.  It's still hard to believe sometimes that he's all ours!