Cloth Diaper Journey: Part One

      Before Allison was born, I played with the idea of cloth diapering her but ultimately decided against it and chose to use disposables. Until recently. I know, I know, it sounds kind of silly to start cloth diapering when your baby is almost two, but Charles and I knew that we were (Lord willing) going to have another kiddo, and since Allison is nowhere near ready to potty train, we decided we might as well give it a shot. Let me tell ya, I'm so mad we didn't start sooner!! Sure I gagged the first time she had a poppy diaper and thought 'what the hell am I doing?', but I haven't looked back since.

     There are a million reasons people choose to cloth diaper, ours was purely economical. We were spending approximately $35 on disposable diapers A MONTH. I didn't really think anything of it until I was talking with a co-worker about how her daughter didn't have any interest until the age of 3.5 (despite her bribing & prodding) to use the 'big girl potty'. I quickly did the math on how much we were going to potentially spend between now and 3.5 and the number made me sick to my stomach ($630 if you were wondering). I get even sicker thinking about how much we have spent on disposables from birth to 20 months.

     I started really researching and reaching out to some of my friends I knew who cloth diapered and asked for tips, tricks, and suggestions. I was overwhelmed with all of the information out there and began narrowing down what I thought would work best for our family! Before I overwhelm you with the multitude of different options there are regarding cloth diapering (Part Two), I will tell you what we decided on.

     We chose to use pocket diapers because they are very similar to disposables in the way you put them on and I can add additional absorbency layers if I need to. Once I knew that I wanted to use pocket diapers, I started looking at brands. The most popular brands (the Mercedes of cloth diapers if you will) are Bumgenius, Grovia, and Blueberry. Diapers from those brands typically run between $18 & $30 a PIECE. I could NOT justify that in anyway so I looked into different brands and fell in love with Alva's. AlvaBaby is a company based out of China and although the diapers come in at a whopping $4 a piece they are so incredibly well made that I can't for the life of me figure out why more people don't use them! Sure they don't have as cute of prints or colors as Bumgenius or Grovia but for something that is just going to be pooped & peed in, I don't really care.

      I ended up spending a grand total of about $200 to build our "stash". For that I got 20 pocket diapers, 4 travel wet bags (this is where the dirty cloth diapers go when you're out and about), a large wet bag and  pail (to store dirty diapers in at home), and a couple of different kinds of laundry soaps. So for $200 we will finish diapering Allison until she is potty trained and diaper the next baby until he or she is also potty trained! Um...WINNING!!! Can you see now why I'm so mad we didn't start sooner? 

The part about cloth diapers that scared me the absolute most was the washing routine, it seemed so incredibly complicated! But like most things, it takes practice and trial and error to find the perfect wash routine that is going to get your diapers smelling clean and fresh every time. I used the website Fluff Love University, to learn what kinds of detergent to use, and to get my washing routine down. Now that I know what I'm doing, I wash once every 3 or 4 days and from start to finish it takes about an hour and  half to two hours! Not to shabby. Also, our water bill and electricity bill hasn't gone up even a cent! 

Added benefit: this adorable little fluff butt! Seriously, isn't she the cutest!? 

If you have any questions about cloth diapering or the process please don't hesitate to ask!