Looney Labs EcoFluxx Mailing list Archive

[Eco] cloth diapers

  • Frombecca@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
  • DateFri, 23 Feb 2007 13:27:34 -0500 (EST)
Luisa asked for a separate thread on cloth diapers.  What is it that you
want to know?  I will explain some basics:

Cloth diapers are one category of merchandise that has benefited vastly
from Internet shopping.  Lots of them are made by work-at-home moms who
run little online businesses.  Even the factory-made brands are mostly
small companies working in the US and Canada.  These little companies have
done a lot of innovating over the past 15-20 years, introducing many new
types of diapers and related equipment, so a huge variety of choices are
available...and many of them are very cute!! :-)

I always knew I would use cloth diapers because my parents and most of my
extended family did, so I saw it as a sensible choice financially and
environmentally.  Also, I had babysat for disposable-diapered babies and
found their diapers hard to tolerate aesthetically; they just feel so fake
and crinkly, not something I'd want wrapped around my body!  When I tried
cloth menstrual pads and found out how much more comfortable they are than
the plastic kind, I was even more convinced both that I wanted my baby in
cloth and that I could tolerate the extra work involved.

Rather than deal with pins, we decided to buy "fitted" diapers, which are
elasticized and fasten with snaps.  They need a separate waterproof cover;
after trying several, we prefer the type that's made from nylon and pulls
on like underpants.  Our initial purchases included one pack of flushable
diaper liners, which we intended to use during the meconium (gunk that
lines baby's intestines before birth and comes out in the first week and
is very sticky) phase, but we found that they are really really handy for
getting poop off the diaper, so we decided that the environment could
handle an extra sheet of thin unbleached paper per poop.  We also bought
washcloths to use as baby wipes, "doublers" which are extra layers of
cloth to increase diaper absorbency when needed, and some laundry bags so
fabulous they merit a separate paragraph.

These laundry bags or "wetbags" are made of nylon, a bit thicker than an
umbrella.  They have a drawstring with toggle.  If you fill one with
WATER, there's some leakage at the seam, and of course if you turn it
upside down most of the water comes out the hole in the drawstringed
opening...but you can fill one with DAMP things and have no leakage at
all!  They also contain odors well.  Aside from use with diapers, wetbags
have radically improved my life in situations like bringing home a wet
swimsuit.  I always used to use a disposable plastic shopping bag, which
often works just fine, but those tend to tear.  Wetbags are durable and
reliable and come in nice colors, too!  Like the nylon diaper covers,
they're easily washed with a squirt of liquid soap and a quick rubbing and
rinsing, or they can go in the washing machine.

We use a large wetbag to line the diaper pail, which is a kitchen-size
stainless-steel trashcan with lid operated by a foot pedal.  It has an
interior plastic bin that I take out and clean every 3 or 4 weeks.  My
parents always stored dirty diapers soaking in water in a tightly sealed
plastic pail, and I remember an unpleasant odor every time that was
opened.  In my pre-motherhood research, I learned that many people these
days use a dry pail, and it's worked out well for us.  It smells better,
and I certainly appreciate not having to lug 10 gallons of water down the
2 flights of stairs to the laundry room!

Before changing a diaper, we wet a washcloth using a "sports" bottle with
pop-up spout that we keep on the changing table.  If the diaper is just
wet, it and the washcloth AND the flushable liner go into the diaper pail;
one of the great things about the liners is that, although they dissolve
like toilet paper when flushed (our upstairs toilet is VERY particular but
does not object to them!), they somehow survive machine-washing and can be
used again up to 4 times or until they get pooped on.  If there's poop, we
take the diaper to the toilet and drop in the liner and all the poop on
it.  Sometimes the liner shifts out of place, so some poop gets on the
diaper.  We have a plastic scraper (supposed to be for dishes) that we use
to clean it off, but that's our least favorite part!  It's not that poop
won't come off in the wash; it's that we prefer to put as much of it as
possible into the toilet rather than into the washing machine where we
wash all our other laundry as well.

Away from home, we're usually changing in a restroom and can wet the
washcloth in the sink.  We keep a small wetbag in the diaper bag to store
used diapers, then put them in the pail at home.

Every 4th day, I take the wetbag full of diapers out of the diaper pail
and empty them into the washing machine.  I run a presoak cycle with hot
water and Bio-Kleen Bac-Out, which is a natural microbicide.  20 minutes
later (or whenever I get to it) I start a wash cycle with hot water and
natural laundry soap.  When that's done, I get the diapers out and hang
them on the drying rack in our laundry room.  Two days later, Nicholas and
I take them off the rack into the basket, and then he puts them into the
dryer, and I run a 20-minute "fluff" cycle with no heat.  This makes the
diapers softer, and the fluffing of their layers improves absorbency.  (We
use a heated dry cycle only if we're behind schedule and need the diapers
before they've had time to air-dry.)

It's not that hard, and I enjoy handling the clean diapers.  They are so
cute and feel like clothing, not like biohazard containment devices.  It's
just part of taking care of my baby.

In addition to the odor difference I mentioned previously, I'm surprised
at how other parents put up with the poor containment abilities of
disposable diapers.  I often hear giggling, eye-rolling stories about the
"blowouts" that result in a complete change of baby's outfit and sometimes
parents' outfits and furniture too!  This has never happened to
Nicholas--and he loves beans and fruits, so it's not that he's producing
less messy stuff; it just stays in his diaper or at least in his diaper
cover.  I often hear about toddlers wetting the bed, while wearing a
diaper, because a disposable can't hold as much as their bladder.  We just
add extra layers to the diaper for overnight.  So I feel we're using a far
superior system!

Our electricity and water bills have increased by only a couple of dollars
a month due to diapers.  The change in the gas bill for the extra hot
water is so small we can't see it.  While the IDEA of poop in our washing
machine is gross, the machine doesn't smell bad or seem dirty; we feel
like our regular laundry is as clean as ever.

Any other questions?
---'Becca

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