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Apr 30, 2013
- Cloth Diapers, Natural Mama
My Cloth Diapering Journey Part 2: The First Five Months
Loveybums Wool Jersey Cover |
Out of all our cloth diapering options, we chose what I think is the least expensive route: prefolds with waterproof/water resistant covers. Prefolds, whether you buy them individually or in a pack, only cost about $2-$4 each. Depending on how often you do laundry, you could get away with buying as little as 24 diapers in each size (more about sizes in a future post), which works out to 12 diapers a day, or a clean diaper every two hours.
Warning to Potential Cloth-Diaper Users: I do realize that the following ramble makes it seem very complicated to use cloth diapers. It doesn't have to be as complicated as I've made it out to be. It can be as simple as buying 24 one-size all-in-one diapers that your baby can wear from birth to potty learning. I, however, made it a bit more complicated by going the least expensive route (prefolds) and experimenting with different covers.
Warning to Potential Cloth-Diaper Users: I do realize that the following ramble makes it seem very complicated to use cloth diapers. It doesn't have to be as complicated as I've made it out to be. It can be as simple as buying 24 one-size all-in-one diapers that your baby can wear from birth to potty learning. I, however, made it a bit more complicated by going the least expensive route (prefolds) and experimenting with different covers.
The First Two Months
Our main daytime system was a cotton prefold, fastened with a Snappi, with a Loveybums wool cover over it. We only had two wool covers in the newborn/small size, so when those got pooped on and needed to be washed (or re-lanolized), we used Bum Genius pocket diapers as covers, just without the inserts.
Another system we tried was the gDiapers brand (a friend wasn't using hers, so she let us borrow her stash). These looked super cute on our boy, but he leaked right through them. I liked them for use at night (when we were changing his diaper every 2-3 hours for night feedings anyway) because I wanted something that was close to the convenience of disposables. In my half-asleep state, I definitely didn't want to mess with folding a diaper and using a Snappi diaper fastener. I would assemble the diapers before bed, and we were good to go. The only major draw back was that the gPants are not waterproof, so having a small stash did not work. We would have had to buy more little pants for it to work for us. Enter the Thirsties Duo Wrap cover, a cover made with PUL or polyurethane laminated fabric. (Made in USA!)
Two Months to Around Four Months
While browsing Green Mountain Diapers, I happened upon the Thirsties Duo Wrap diaper covers and decided to try them out. I was looking for something similar to gDiapers that would actually hold in any leaks. With these covers, I could fold the diaper in thirds, lay the diaper inside the cover without a fastener, and I had a quick way to change Hunter's diaper in the middle of the night. If all he did was pee, I could reuse the PUL cover many times before needing to launder it. Another feature that makes these covers so great is the leg gussets. Even though Hunter would get poop on the inside, the gussets did a great job of keeping pee and poop off his clothes. This system quickly became my go-to for when we were out and about or leaving Hunter with my mom. It makes changing a cloth diaper as easy as using a disposable. You just have the diapers pre-assembled in the cover and go!