Tell me about cloth diapers

In My Humble Opinion
21

Ok, this is encouraging. I was all psyched for the cloth, but a buddy of mine, with very good green creds, shook his head and said, “We tried. But, then we put on a disposable and stopped using the cloth.” I guess I’ll give it a good try.

What about two things: child care. I’m assuming they’re mostly going to be in favor of disposable? I mean, we’re in San Francisco, so maybe there will be green child care. I should really start looking at that…

and, what about when you’re out and about? Still using the cloths and just packing up the nasty used ones, or using disposables at times?

Thanks everyone for the help to this hopeless and terrified non-baby guy!

22

We always used cloth when we were out and about. When we traveled, especially if it was for more than a couple days, we’d use disposable. You can do that…it doesn’t have to be one or the other. I don’t have personal experience with daycare, but for the most part, I understand that a lot of daycares will not deal with cloth diapers. You should always ask, though…I have heard of some that will do it if you have all-in-ones.

23

The sprog’s daycare required disposables because they were more sanitary in that environment. When the child was changed, the dirty diaper went in the trash, and the trash was sent to the dumpster every few hours. There were also times when the child’s dirty diapers needed to be bagged separately and taken straight to the dumpster, like after some vaccinations and if the child had had a virus recently, and you can’t do that with cloth.

I don’t know if there are state requirements on that, because this daycare was owned and operated by the Defense Department. But there may be, so you’re going to want to take that in stride.

24

Congratulations, fiveyearlurker and Arglefraster! We considered cloth diapers, but shelved the idea, mostly because of the daycare issue (which I understand–keeping track of which dirty diapers go home with which kid sounds like a major pain in the ass). Also, my mom (aka chief babysitter) made it clear that after cloth diapering with me and my brother, she was not willing to go down that road again with her grandkids.

My sister-in-law uses FuzziBunz with her kids. I’ve found them convenient and not too gross when babysitting. She puts the kids in disposables at night and for long car trips. When out and about, she just puts the dirty diapers in a plastic bag and socks them in the diaper bag.

25

When we were in Seattle, we did find a day care that used cloth diapers on the kids, so it’s not unheard of, but in general I think most day care centers do require disposables. You’re in SF, though, so look around.

I’ve used cloth diapers with all 3 of my kids now. I started with just plain prefolds and Velcro-closing wrap covers, which worked perfectly well, really. With my second baby, I got a little more fancy and bought some all-in-ones and pocket diapers. The pocket diapers worked really well, and with my third baby, that’s primarily what I used. My brand of choice was Fuzzi Bunz, because I prefer snaps to Velcro. First of all, the Velcro is a pain in the washing machine (you have to fold the Velcro tabs down before washing if you don’t want all the diapers to link up and form a giant diaper chain in there) and second, once the child gets to a certain age, he can undo the Velcro very easily, but the snaps are a bit more difficult. All of mine have had a “let’s strip the diaper off and run around naked” phase, so I like the snaps.

The nice thing about pocket diapers also is that you can vary the absorbency based on what you stuff the pocket with. You can go with just a simple microfiber insert for regular use, or use a prefold + insert for overnight, or whatever.

We just used a Rubbermaid trash can with a lid for our diaper pail. When they’re still breastfed only, you can just throw the whole diaper in there without rinsing. Once they’re on solid foods, you need to rinse the “solids” (my preferred euphemism around the squeamish) before tossing the diaper in the pail. For outings, we have either used disposables, or packed some pre-stuffed pocket diapers with us, and plastic bags for sealing up the used cloth diaper and tucking into the “wet bag” that came with our diaper bag.

Some cloth diapering people are really fanatical about never letting a disposable diaper touch their baby’s skin or whatever, but it doesn’t have to be an either/or thing. We’ve always kept some disposables around for using when I let the diaper laundry go a bit too long and ran out of cloth diapers, or for long car trips, or whatever. Although you can very easily use all cloth and never disposables, too. It’s all a matter of personal preference.

Oh, and we did use a diaper service for the first four months we had a baby. It was actually quite nice, but we ultimately discontinued it because it was cheaper to do it ourselves. It’s a nice alternative if you don’t mind the price, though.

26

Those are the old diaper genies – I don’t think you can buy them in stores anymore (although I’m sure some other brand of pail makes similar diaper chains!). The current diaper genies put all of the dirty diapers into one “bag.” So instead of ending up with a whole chain of sausages, you end up with just one diaper sausage.

We use disposables (didn’t get on the ball early enough with the cloth diapers, and then couldn’t afford the initial outlay while we were also paying hospital bills), and we have 2 diaper pails - one regular step-on garbage can for wet diapers, and the diaper genie for poopy diapers. That keeps the cost of the special diaper genie bags down (especially because before my son started on solid food, he only pooped every 2 weeks. No, that’s not a typo.) while still controlling the odor. And the diaper genie controls the odor very, very well.

Also, I suspect that (in certain areas of the country, at least) cloth diapers are more popular than you think – you just don’t see ads for them on TV.

27

Wow lot of great tips, thanks! Some of the names are giving me giggle fits (fuzzy bunz, hee!) We’re also going to need daycare, so we’ll have to check to see if they will take cloth. I suppose if need be we could always do disposables at daycare and cloth at home. I want to at least give it a shot. Thanks guys!

28

Nope - a regular diaper pail, with a lid that closes. A diaper genie, as wonderful as it is for poopy disposables, is designed to seal each dipe individually in plastic. You don’t want to have to fumble with slicing open that plastic for each cloth diaper.

You’d need to plan on doing laundry daily, I’d think.

We used a diaper service for a couple of months with Dweezil. This was nearly 15 years ago, and we found he tended to leak a lot with the wet diapers, so ultimately gave up on them. The diaper service diapers were rough, which he didn’t seem to mind. They did have to be changed pretty frequently which I think is the big reason a lot of kids have less trouble with diaper rash. Sleeping wasn’t an issue, as Dweezil didn’t. At all. So the switch to disposables had no effect on that.

They’re inconvenient when you’re out and about; you’ll want to have a pretty good stash of Zip-loc bags to seal them up for the return trip home. Or simply use disposables when you’re going out.

29

Nah. I do diaper laundry every 2-3 days.

30

I tried cloth (DSQ chineese prefolds with a snappi and wrap covers) with my first daughter for about two months. She was breast fed and she was a frequent (8 times a day) pooper. BF baby poops can be very runny. I got tired of all the blow outs and gave up.
Later when she started solid foods I was even more thankfull for disposables.

31

Some day care centers do have a policy against cloth, you might have an easier time with private daycare.

My son went to an in-home daycare, and I just asked the provider to let me show her how they worked. She definitely had the pins-and-rubber-pants in mind and when I showed her the fuzzi bunz and how really it wasn’t any more complicated than a 'sposie, she was willing to give it a try. I gave her a ziplock bag to put the used ones into, and it all worked out well.

I washed every 2 - 3 days, and line dried as much as possible.

32

But why would someone use cloth, outside of an allergy type issue? I’m not being snarky, but what are the reasons?

33

Reduce, reuse, recycle? Plus, you’ll never be out of diapers at 3 AM. Maybe out of clean ones, but not out of diapers!

34

Our reason was primarily cost. It was a lot cheaper to use cloth than disposables. Also, the fact that it creates less waste was appealing. Some people also like to avoid the chemical stuff in the disposable diapers, although that wasn’t really one of my motivations.

35

By the way, the environmental impact seems to be a wash from what I’ve read - yes, they don’t go in landfills, but they also take a lot of energy to clean. I guess it depends on whether you live somewhere with a water problem or not.

36

I believe that the study that came to that conclusion was comparing disposables to a diaper service, so the industrial cleaning techniques and the transport of the diapers caused them to be about even in environmental impact.

37

I used cloth diapers because I could make more informed decisions about what was touching my kids genitals and butt. Kind of along the same lines as watning the be able to pronounce the ingredients for most of what they eat.

I also liked that the cost outlay was front-loaded…after I spent the $200 or so on the diapers, the extra cost of water, electricity and cleaners was so incremental that it didn’t alter our budget. $30 weekly for disposables would.

Finally, after I started doing it I found I really liked it. I liked the process of getting the diapers clean, the wonderful smell of them after a good washing and drying in the sun. I also liked the TOTALLY CUTE patterns and colors on the diapers. And fat cloth-diaper-baby-butt is freaking cute.

38

Those of you who used disposables, did you all have washing machines in your houses?

If all goes to plan, my husband and I will have an infant for several months in an apartment with unreliable shared washing machines - half the time they don’t drain, or the dryer won’t dry, etc.

We like the idea of cloth, but are thinking of waiting until we move for them - how realistic is it to lug them to a laundromat when you’re also taking care of your first baby at the same time? Our laundromat is only a couple of blocks away.

39

I am very pro cloth diaper (can you tell?) but I think it would be impossible to launder your own diapers at a laundromat. Possibly illegal, or at least against their rules. Other people’s poop is not what I want to wash my clothing in. For my own family I knew I ran a load of whites with bleach every few days and that was sanitary enough for us.

You might want to check out counter top washing machines. I’ve never tried them out but you could keep it right in your bathroom and run a small load whenever you needed to.

40

Thanks! That’s what I was thinking, even aside from getting there several times a week.

I think when it comes down to it, we’ll probably start with disposables, unless countertop washers are REALLY cheap - we’ll be moving 3 months, at most, after said future kid would be born, and into someplace that has our own washer/dryer.

Or, maybe it’ll just take awhile to get pregnant and there won’t be a kid until after we move!