Let's start with the expense. Yes, at the start of cloth diapering you might spend a lot of money, but if you're smart about what you buy, the diapers can and will last from birth to potty training. I highly recommend using one size pocket diapers. They are adjustable so that most will fit babies ranging from 8 pounds to 30 pounds. There are oodles of brands of pocket diapers. My two favorites are Bum Genius and Blueberry. I also like Kawaii and Fuzzibunz. These are the diapers that have worked for us. That doesn't necessarily mean they will work for everyone. Now, if you buy these diapers brand new, yeah you'll spend a lot building your stash. However, there are tons of great websites out there in which you can score some amazing deals. By far, my favorite is diaperswappers.com. It's a forum that you register for (free of course) and people buy, sell, and trade their cloth diapers. Maybe the thought of buying someone's used cloth diapers grosses you out but honestly, all the diapers I've gotten have been clean, and in decent condition. You can also get some good deals by shopping the clearance section of cloth diaper websites. Many times the diapers in there are "seconds," meaning they've never been used but there's something aesthetically wrong with them. I've gotten a few of these and I can't ever tell what's wrong with the diapers. They function well and they look good in my opinion. Right now in my stash I have around 40 pocket diapers. I think I probably spent around $350 for all of that....well maybe a little more but probably not much more than $400. Compare that to what I would spend on disposables in a year with two babies: We go through 10-12 diapers a day, and there's about 90 diapers in a box (depending on the size). So I'd need a new box approximately every 9 days. So let's just say 3 boxes a month. I buy the store brand and that's usually $16 a box times 36....$576. In one year. And most babies are in diapers for around 2 years. Plus you can use your cloth diapers again with subsequent children. This is a no brainer; cloth diapers are cheaper.
Next excuse, daycare won't take them. Okay this is true if you use a daycare facility. However, if you're lucky like me and have an in-home daycare provider who doesn't mind doing the cloth diapers, then this is not an excuse. Even if your daycare won't do cloth diapers, you can still do them at home at night and on the weekends.
Okay the big excuse, time and effort. Yes, cloth diapering does take a little extra time, a little extra effort but not that much. We launder the diapers every other day. Honestly, we probably wouldn't need to do it that much but our diaper bin gets full after 2 days and washing them that frequently means I never worry about running out of clean diapers. The laundering part isn't that bad once you get used to it. We do a rinse cycle (to get all the nasties out), regular wash, and then 2 more rinse cycles (to prevent residue build up and prevent smells). Then I usually line dry everything. Now lately, I've been drying the inserts in the dryer until they're just damp and then I'll line dry them. Then, once they're dry, sit in front of the TV and stuff the pockets. That only takes me about 15-20 minutes to do. I'm sure we all veg out in front of the TV for at least 20 minutes every night. And as a bonus for me, my hands are busy so that means I'm not mindlessly snacking (a horrible evening habit of mine!). Really, once you have a system it's very easy. During the summer when neither of us was working, it was super easy. But we've both been back at work for a week now, and the girls wear cloth diapers to daycare, requiring a little more effort on my part after work (not much- just pulling the inserts out of the pockets from the dirty dipes at daycare; takes 5 minutes). So bottom line, if we can make it work, anyone can.
The ick factor: well no one likes cleaning out dirty diapers. But you get used to it I guess. Obviously pee diapers are easy to deal with. And if your baby is just on breastmilk, that's easy too. Those can go straight in the hamper. Once your baby is on solids though (or if they drink formula) then it can get a little interesting. Yes, you do need to try and remove the poo before you throw the dipes in the hamper. There are various methods of doing this. A lot of times if you just shake the diaper over the toilet, most of the poo falls off by itself. Occasionally, I have to dunk the diaper and swish it around (and yes I have a strategy for doing this so that my hand doesn't come near the toilet water) and when I'm really desperate, I break out our $1 spatula to scrape the poo off (and that spatula sits in an old wipes container on the floor behind the toilet). Many moms use a diaper sprayer. I actually would like to look into getting one but they're kind of expensive. Of course I don't get all the poo off the dipes before they go in the wash but that's what the rinse cycle is for before you do the regular cycle with soap!
Ahh I thought of another excuse......the added expense of doing extra laundry cycles. I think this one is pretty minimal. Our water bill has gone up but I think that's more due to the fact that Walker's been filling our kiddie pool every other day during the summer. Now that the pool has been put away I think our bill will come back down. I would be very surprised if the extra cycles added more than $5 to our monthly bill. Even if it did at $5 extra per month, that's still cheaper in the long run than doing disposables!
So I've now squashed all excuses. I highly recommend cloth diapering to everyone, even if you've been using disposables for a while. Buy a few and see how you like using them. I bet you'll be hooked. Plus, look at all the cute colors and prints you can get! So go forth, and cloth diaper!
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