So when you think of diapers you think of the disposable kind, right? I always did. It’s the most common path to take and it’s the easiest. However, it’s not the best for the planet, the baby, or your wallet. Now for the record, I do NOT mean for this post to be preachy about cloth diapers. I’m just going to toss what I know out there and y’all can take it as you will.
My mom did cloth diapers with me when I was a baby. My grandmother paid for a service to come and pick them up weekly and wash them. They were even the kind that you had to pin closed (my mom admits to having stuck me a couple times – ouch!) and needed to be covered with plastic undies to help protect clothes and stuff from leaks. Guess what? It ain’t like that anymore!
We decided to go with cloth diapers after hearing about the experience from our Bradley teacher and reading about it. We got our diapers from Bum Genius and they’re awesome. There’s cool designs, they snap shut (though you can get the Velcro kind if you want), and they adjust to grow with baby. Plus they’re durable enough that if you take good care of them, you can use them for baby#2.
You buy the detergent for them and wash them yourself and hang dry. It’s really easy. When the baby gets older and eats solid foods, there’s a sprayer that you can get to attach to the toilet to spray off the solid poo before washing. Did you know that you’re supposed to do that with disposable diapers too? Most people don’t it, either because it’s gross and an extra step in the process, or because they simply didn’t know. I certainly never knew it.
With disposables, you don’t have to wash them, but you do have to keep buying them, which gets expensive quickly. Plus you sometimes have to make those last minute, late night runs for diapers because you’re out. I don’t know about you, but that’s annoying.
We got the cloth diapers, but when our little TC decided to come out two weeks early at only 7 pounds, they didn’t fit her. They’re slated to fit 10 pounds and up. You want to use disposables for the first week or so anyway because of meconium. It’s black and tarry and will stain everything it touches. So we used disposables for the first couple weeks, then had to keep using them because she’s so small. She’s almost 2 months old and I hope she grows into the cloth diapers soon so we can just have some disposables on hand for long trips or emergencies.
So yeah, anyway, that’s my ramble on diapers and the debate between cloth and disposables. I’m honestly cool with either at this point seeing as I’m hoping the washing isn’t bothersome and I have to admit the disposables are damned easy.