Results of my cloth diaper experiment / extravaganza !!

[egoldber]

I promised to post the results of my cloth diaper experiment and here it is! As usual, I’m pretty long winded (sorry!). If anyone else has any cloth diapers they can review I would love to read about it!

Overall I have found that I really enjoy cloth diapering. It is actually (I think) rather fun. There are so many options and varieties available, it is much more fun and interesting than the “Pampers, Huggies or store brand dilemma!!” On the other hand, the fact that there are so many choices available makes getting started really overwhelming for the newbie. Also, the only cloth diapering supplies you are likely to find in your local stores are garbage, so you are pretty much limited to on-line shopping.

I figure I will use fitteds with covers about half the time, All in Ones when out and prefolds when I run low on fitteds at home. The fitteds will mostly be Motherease Onesize diapers (that I hope I will be able to use again with baby #2). My main nighttime diaper will be Motherease Sandies. I have placed two "large" orders and when they arrive I will have about 3 dozen diapers and 7 covers.

Prefolds: I tried the bleached Chinese prefolds from naturalbabies.com. I tried premium and regular. The regular are almost too small for Sarah, so I ordered more premiums. These aren’t as bad as I thought they’d be, but I don’t prefer them. I was using the "traditional/angel wing" fold to start with and they were too bulky in front. I then read about a bikini fold, and that seems to work really well for Sarah. A premium fits perfectly in the medium/large Motherease Airflow cover. My prefold "system" is a premium prefold with the bikini fold, held together with a Snappi in a ME Airflow cover. Here’s a good link to some folds: http://www.dy-dee.com/html/Folding/folding.html

Fitteds: These are great and will be my mainstay. Easy to use and not as expensive as AIOs. Would be OK for out and about, but an AIO makes struggling with the fold down changing station in the Target ladies room MUCH easier.

I have tried these fitteds: Kissaluvs, Kushies Classic, Motherease Sandies, Motherease Onesize

Kissaluvs: These are really nice, very plush and absorbent and very easy to use, but the size 1 is snug on her now, even though she is within the weight range. I am ordering one in a size 2 also just to try, but in general I am going with the ME Onesize over these because of the re-use factor. But since I will still need some newborn fitteds whenever baby#2 arrives, when that time comes, I will definitely try the Kissaluvs Newborn (size 0).

Kushies Classic: I liked this OK, but not as well as the Kissaluvs which are less expensive. I love the feel of the flannel exterior, but the interior flannel in these takes much longer to dry than does the terry/fleece in other fitteds I tried. I have seen these in BuyBuyBaby stores, so they are more readily available for registries if a BBB is in your area.

Motherease Sandies: These are another very plush and easy to use diaper, (I see why KathyO really likes them) with snap sides, which I find easier to use in general. The Large size fits perfectly on Sarah right now on the smallest setting, so she has plenty of room to grow into them. They are a little more expensive than the ME Onesize. I find I don’t need a liner/doubler during the day. With a Sandy liner they are great for nighttime (if a bit bulky). I will order some of these to use as my nighttime diaper. I am going with the Onesize over the Sandies for most of the time, again because of the re-use factor. These are not trim fitting at all and give baby a big bubble butt. I LOVE these diapers and hope I don’t regret ordering more Onesizes instead.

ME Onesize: These are a great, easy to use diaper. Not as plush as the Sandy and I need to use the Snap-in liner pretty much all the time. But they work fine for daytime. They are supposed to go from newborn (well 10-12 pounds) to 35 pounds, so I hope to get a lot of use from these both with Sarah and with a next baby (or two :) ).


AIOs I tried: Kushies Ultra AIO, Bumkins, Motherease, Fuzzibunz

Kushies Ultra (AIO): This is a relatively inexpensive and very easy to use all in one. It works OK for me, but again takes a long time to dry due to the flannel. It has a very "plasticky" smell though and is not a favorite. For a dollar or two more, I would buy Bumkins. The nice thing is I found I didn’t need a doubler for absorbancy even for naps, because they have a built in one.

Bumkins AIO: This an easy to use diaper. Great for reluctant DHs and to show off to mommy friends how "easy" cloth is. They are not the most absorbent in the world, but OK. Great for the diaper bag. I have no trouble getting them dry.

Motherease AIO: These are very plush and I love them. They have the side snaps that I prefer over the velcro or front snaps. They are rather expensive. I love the look on the baby though (I find I am coming to love the cloth diaper big bubble butt!).

FuzziBunz: Not really an AIO, but an AIO type. These really do work very well and have a great feel. But, I found it to be a pain to “stuff” the diaper, I would much rather lay in or snap in a liner. Also, they are astronomically expensive at $15 a diaper PLUS you have to buy the inserts separately. You can use a prefold as an insert, but many people prefer using two Fuzzibunz microfiber terry inserts (at $4.50 each) or two JoeyBunz (by BabyKicks for $4.75 each) so you end up with a $20 diaper. I didn’t like them THAT well and won’t be buying more unless I find a need for them.


Covers: Bummis, Prorap, Motherease Airflow, Motherease Rikki, Kushies

The Bummis Super Whisper Wrap with Velcro are quite nice, but I can’t seem to fit a premium prefold in a medium cover. (These were the best Velcro cover I tried). Fitted diapers seem to fit just fine in this cover though. I REALLY like the Motherease Airflow cover, but I can’t seem to get the Motherease Rikki wrap to work for me at all. I also used a Proraps, which is inexpensive and OK, but not great. But many people like them. The Kushies worked just fine, but seemed very cheaply made compared to the others.

Yikes, this got long! I'll post again with more info about inserts, liners, etc.

[egoldber]

OK, here's the rest of the stuff:

Soakers/Doublers/Liners/Inserts: I tried a bunch.

FuzziBunz inserts: These work very well for me. I have used 2 of these at night in a Fuzzibunz with no problems. I have also used one FuzziBunz insert and one JoeyBunz insert with good success. They are similar in cost to Joeybunz. (FYI, I got the old style rectangular ones, not the new style Joeybunz shaped ones.)

Joeybunz: These are VERY nice soakers. They are made from hemp, which is considered much more absorbent than cotton of the same weight, so you get more absorption for less bulk. I have 3 and love them. They are little expensive, but add a lot of absorption with little bulk.

Motherease: The Sandy liners are also great. Not quite as absorbant as JoeyBunz and more bulky, but also cost less than half as much. The Motherease Snap in liner is essential in the ME Onesize and work great for a daytime diaper.

Organic fleece doubler (from Kelly’s Closet): This is a nice, small doubler to use in a prefold that adds relatively little bulk.

Fleece Liners: I made my own by cutting a microfiber fleece I already had in my fabric stash into 4"x15" in rectangles. These have worked great.

Organic fleece liners (from Kelly's Closet): I ordered these before I remembered I had microfleece in my fabric stash. Haven’t used them yet. They were relatively inexpensive, but are much thicker and shorter than the ones I made.

Disposable liners: I bought some "disposable" Gerber ones from BRU. They are not flushable, but so far poop has just fallen off right into the toilet. I have washed them several times and they are still going strong. I ordered some Kushies flushable liners, but they were back-ordered and haven’t arrived yet. The reusables seem to be working OK, but I can see where flushable would be very convenient.

Here's some thoughts on the websites I ordered from:

Kelly's Closet: I was a little annoyed she was out of a product and didn’t make it obvious in my order or on the website. She doesn’t charge shipping, which is nice, so if she has what you need at a comparable price, it’s a good site. My order (except the backordered liners) came very quickly.

Naturalbabies.com: Fabulous selection and service. No problems. My first choice to order from again.

Motherease: Great service and turn around.


Other stuff:

Diaper pail: For the first few days I used a 5 gallon bucket that used to have kitty litter. After a few days I got a 28 quart Sterilite trash can with lid from Target for $5.

Pail liners: I bought a Bummis XL for main diaper pail (downstairs), a medium for back-up diaper pail upstairs) and a small for the diaper bag.

Diaper bags: I had 2 bags which turned out not to be big enough for me with cloth diapers. I bought a Combi Traditional bag that I have been very happy with. If I had had a Lands End Do it All size bag to start with, I would have been fine.

Organization: I found that I needed some additional organization to make cloth work for me. I bought 4 plastic Rubbermaid bins from Bed, Bath&Beyond for $5 each (and used a $5 off coupon) and they have worked great so far.

More random stuff:

Also, I sort of picked a bad time to start CD-ing Sarah, because I have found that she is between sizes right now. Not sure how much she weighs right now. She was almost 21 pounds at 12 months and the cutoff for many Medium to Large size is around 22 pounds. In some of the diapers a medium is just fine, and in others while they still fit, the fit is very snug and leaves very little room for a doubler or insert. In other large diapers, the smallest setting just fits her, but I figure she will have room to grow into them. In retrospect, I should have gone with all larges in the samplers I bought.

General preference I have developed:

Snaps over Velcro. This surprised me, but I found that the Velcro often gave Sarah marks. I also prefer side snaps over front snaps. I like fitteds over AIO or prefolds. They are very easy to use and generally a fair bit cheaper than AIOs and dry faster. Prefolds are actually not as bad as I thought they would be, but I don’t think they are a lot of fun. They are however, VERY economical. You could easily get a whole diaper system for <$100 if you were willing to only use prefolds.

Just a few comments on how I got started. I researched and found 3 web sources that got consistently good reviews and ordered a sampler from each site. Each sampler included samples of one or two generally available diapers, usually a fitted, an all-in-one type (AIO) and a cover. Some also had samples of pre-folds, the traditional cloth diaper that most people think of. I ordered 3 samplers which had as many different types of generally well-liked diapers that I could find. This gave me about a day’s worth of cloth diapering supplies and let me try out the whole thing for a few days to see if I liked it. One advantage to this is that if I decided I didn’t like it, since the stuff I bought was “name brand”, I could always resell pretty easily on Ebay or on the ParentsPlace flea market board and get most of my money back.

Well, hopefully this ramble will be useful to someone!

[KathyO]

It's already been useful to me! I think I'll lay in a couple of those Joeybunz liners for my little Niagara Falls pee-monster! (Fastest kidneys in the west...)

Thanks for taking the time to do all that!

Cheers,

KathyO

[egoldber]

FYI, the Joeys need to washed and dried several time before reaching full absorption power! Also, I found that a medium Joey fits perfectly in the large Sandy.

HTH,

[megsmom]

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!

I may print this thread for future reference! Really, I am quite intrigued by all of this cloth diapering stuff and reading all of these reviews makes me really think about this for baby #2. I think I would have not handled it well in the beginning, but now maybe it wouldn't be so bad since I'm used to the whole baby thing. I sincerely do applaud you cloth diapering ladies. My only concerns are the startup costs and since I have Meg in part-time daycare how economical it would be for me to do both cloth and disposables. The truth here, how stinky is this business? Are the pails keeping the smell in?

Jen
mom to Meghan
born 7/13/01

[egoldber]

Jen, it really isn't stinky. I think the key is to do laundry fairly often (no more than 2-3 days between washings.) That is one of downsides, is the increase in laundry. But for me the biggest downside so far is DH is completely SCARED to change a diaper. Of course he works all day and travels a lot (as you know), so the number of diapers he changes is minimal anyway.

To keep costs down you can buy used diapers off Ebay and other places.

I also agree that I don't know if I could have handled it in the beginning as scared and overwhelmed first time mom, but people do!

HTH,

[nohomama]

Another way to ease into cloth diapering with baby #2 is to use a service for a few weeks. Obviously, it isn't an option for everyone (We live in Northampton, MA and were stunned to discover there's only ONE diaper service in all of Massachusetts). I was lucky enough to receive 3 monthes of diaper service as a shower gift. By the time I started laundering my own diapers I was not only comfortable with the whole cloth diapering thing, but enjoyed it too.

Sarah

I also agree with Beth. Cloth dipes don't get that stinky usless you let them sit for a long time.

[KathyO]

You could probably sit down and work out the costs of full-time disposable versus part-time cloth/part-time disposable. I'm sure you'd still save money, and I know a number of folks who go the part-time route. And when considering cloth startup costs, remember that many/most cloth diapers have resale value when you're done with them. (The same is not true of disposables...:P )

I am a lazy launderer - I do laundry every 3-4 days, and there's still no smell worth mentioning. The only really yucky chore is scraping and sloshing and wringing a really explosively mega-poopy diaper in the toilet, but that doesn't happen very often, and I'm never cleaning poopy clothes because we don't ever get diaper blowouts. And, well, like I say - it's only baby poop. Thousands of years of cloth (and various other materials) diapering, then one generation of disposable diapers, and we somehow developed this collective phobia about doodoo... Like Beth, I was surprised by how easy cloth turned out to be!

Cheers,

KathyO

[natividad]

Thanks Beth for posting such incredible and complete review.

I had been thinking about going the cloth diaper route for some time, but just did not know "where to start". Your review helps a great deal. Unlike your situation, I would like to start using CD from birth. Here are a couple of concerns/questions that I have.

I must admit that the whole thing sounds a bit overwhelming with all the different names/varieties of just about every single diaper and accessory out there, but nonetheless, this is what I have been able to decipher.

For simplicity's sake, I think I will stick with ordering from just two websites - Motherease and Naturalbabies. I think I will order prefolds from Naturalbabies just to have around the house. And since they are so inexpensive, I might as well have some.

Now the real questions: Since I will be a first time mom and a first time CD user, I would like to try the most convenient diaper system available. Should I go with only ALL in Ones (no liners, covers, etc.) diapers all the time? How many AIO should I have, if I decide to go this route? I am thinking that I will go with Motherease for the AIO's.

Or, should I go for some fitteds as well? My washer/dryer is rather old and am afraid of the drying time required for AIO's (did I read some AIO's take a long time to dry, or it just the Kushies brand?). I am thinking of the ME Sandies for the fitteds.

I was looking at the packages that ME has online. It seems that in my case, since I will be starting from birth, the complete package makes sense, but I am thinking that perhaps I should go with a part-time package just in case. What do you all think? All in all Beth you mentioned you will have 3 dozen diapers and 7 covers. How many of each kind (prefolds, fitteds, AIO's) will you have?

Can anyone else give me any other suggestions/recommentions for using CD from birth?

Thanks in advance for your help ladies!

Naty (March 03)

[KathyO]

My advice on using CD from birth would be to go with your inexpensive prefolds initially, while you try out a few other popular diapers and decide what you want more of. I don't know any two people who prefer the same CD setup, so the odds are that you will end up preferring a different arrangement than any of us.

I thought I wanted ME One-Sizes, with the Airflow covers. Upon experimentation, I found that the Sandies worked best for us, and a couple of both types of covers, since they fit differently at different weight ranges. Beth took this several steps further, and tried a whole spectrum of popular diapers. All of them have their devotees, but some worked well for her and some didn't.

It'll seem like a hassle at the time, but you'll end up with something you really like, instead of trying to sell off something you turned out not to like!

Best wishes!

KathyO

[egoldber]

I would really order samples before committing to a type. You never know what is going to fit your baby. For example, I had read such great things about Fuzzibunz on all the cloth diaper boards. But when I tried them, they were OK, but not great, at least for me. I had also read terrible things about Kushies, but I thought they were OK. And people seem to either love or hate Motherease diapers (and you can find these ALL the time on Ebay). The naturalbabies sampler is really good and I think she has a newborn sampler also.

AIOs are certainly easiest. But they are also VERY expensive compared to others. Fitteds are a bit less expensive and almost as convenient. You should certainly try the prefolds. One of my problems with prefolds is that since I don't have much practice with them, it takes me awhile to put it on Sarah and she loses patience with me. With a newborn, they just lay there :) so that's not really an issue.

My breakdown is: a dozen premium prefolds, 15 fitteds, 8 AIOs and 7 covers (this includes the covers I got in samplers but that I don't really like and avoid using unless I have to :) ). I think this is a pretty "lean" system, but I figure I will pick up an occasional used fitted or AIO off Ebay or the ParentsPlace Flea market just to try and that will round out my system.

Check out the ParentsPlace Diaper board also for good advice. Also some of the posts in the other discussions mentioned a lot of other sites which give a lot of good info. I think diaperpin.com is especially good.

HTH,

[KathyO]

Oh, and another thought... do consider laying in a package, or maybe two, of disposable diapers. Even assuming that you have the perfect birth (two hours of labour, three minutes of pushing, no tearing or episiotomy, up dancing the tango again within the hour...), coming home with the baby is going to explode your lifestyle into a jillion pieces. It'll take a few days, or even a few more, to assemble some new routines and ways of doing things. And if you've had a c-section or anything like that, your general ability to cope will be puddled around your ankles like so much cheap underwear.

A few days of disposables can give you a bit of grace to get things running in their new channels before you add another thing-to-keep-track-of to your load. It'll all work out, but this may cut you a couple of inches of slack when you really need it.

Cheers,

KathyO

P.S. - I agree with Beth - AIOs are nice, but not THAT much easier than diapers and wraps. And I have liked being able to use different wrap styles when my daughter's size/shape required. Oh, and when the wraps are separate, they don't have to go through the same wash and drying as the diapers every time, and this will prolong their life quite a bit. When the AIO's wrap component loses its water-tightness, you're SOL.

[natividad]

Thanks Beth and KathyO for the very helpful tips. I will definitely order the newborn samples to see what will work for me. The tip on having some disposables in the first few days or weeks (just in case) is also right on the mark. Thanks again ladies.

Naty (March 03)

[Caroline99]

Wow! Thanks! I am of the "plan to try cloth diapers from birth" camp as well. And was also clueless as to where to start. This has given me a good idea of where to jump off!

Thanks!

[egoldber]

FYI, here's some cost info for those interested:

Disposable expenses:
Spent so far in first 14 months: $940
Estimated cost for 3 years of disposables: $2340
Additional expenses to use disposable for second child for 3 years: $2340
Total for 2 children for 3 years: $4680
(Estimated using a cost of $10 for a size 4 jumbo package of Pampers with 42 diapers and changing Sarah 9 times a day. We've used size 4 for almost 8 of her 14 months and they still fit fine, I think this is a pretty good estimate.)

Cloth expenses to date: $428
Estimated additional expenses as Sarah grows: $100
Estimated additional expenses for ANOTHER child: $300
Estimated additional costs for cloth diapering (detergent, electricity, etc.): $100
Total to cloth diaper 2 children for 3 years: $928
(This was estimated using full retail prices. Bargain hunting would be about 2/3 of this cost. If I were willing to do ONLY prefolds, total full retail cost would be about $300 over 3 years from newborn to toddler for 2 children.)

This helped me talk to my DH about this (although he's still not completely convinced :) ).

HTH,

[megsmom]

Thanks again, Beth!

I was doing some similar figuring in my head the other day while standing in line at Target. I buy practically the cheapest generic diapers out there and still spent 28 bucks for about 4-6 weeks of diapers. No reuse value there either! My husband and I were concerned about the initial startup costs of cloth, but feel strongly that the environment needs some help. I also think it won't be too hard on us since we'll only be able to do this part time, and probably fun for me since it would involve fooling with more baby stuff! :) He still needs just a little more convincing, so your cost breakdown should do it!

I've done some more pondering and think I am going to order pretty much the same sampler packs you ordered, Beth, from naturalbabies.com and motherease just to try out the prefolds and other fitteds. Most likely I will fall in love with the most expensive kind!

Jen
mom to Meghan
born 7/13/01

[egoldber]

Just thought I'd add one more piece of info that I learned the hard way. AVOID DESITIN of ANY TYPE. I had read on other websites that the fish oils in regular Desitin could stain cloth diapers. I had a couple tubes of Desitin Creamy. I read the ingredients and there were no fish oils, so I thought it was safe to use. WRONG. I had a devil of a time getting it out of about three diapers. (FYI, Dawn dishwashing liquid saved the day.)

HTH,

[nohomama]

Beth,

When Lola was born we started out with a diaper service and the owner was a stickler about the diaper creams that her customers used (we lovingly referred to her as the "Diaper Nazi"). According to her it's apparently the high zinc content that causes staining. Desitin was her least favorite because it was something like 80-90% zinc. When Lola's red we use Weleda Diaper Care which is only 12% zinc. It clears up any hint of a rash right away and we haven't had any problems with staining.