The Connecticutian

I recently had someone ask me about our cloth diaper use, so I thought it might be helpful to post our experience with cloth diapers. We actually really liked using them, though we used a combination of cloth and disposable.

So we bought two kinds of cloth diapers — fuzzibunz and Bumgenius. I’m lying — we also bought prefolds, Thirsties, and gDiapers. Sujal was not really that comfy with the prefolds (He thought they looked too giant on the newborn Che), so we abandoned them quickly, though we still used the prefolds as under-the-baby-changing-absorbers in case he had an open air accident. The Thirsties were diaper covers, if I recall correctly. The gDiapers were with the flushable liners. I found that they leaked more than other diapers, so I didn’t love them, but they were okay. I’ve since sold them.

The fuzzibunz (pocket diaper) have snaps to change the sizing — and they are fine. We don’t love them, but they are fine. The are infinitely easier to stuff than the Bumgenius. We mainly use the Bumgenius — they have snaps to resize, but the closures are velcro-like. We like that because there is the most room for adjustment with them. While the Fuzzibunz have lots of snaps for a variety of sizes, it always feels like guesswork.

Our goal is to use the cloth diapers all the time at home with the exception of nighttime. The reality is the cloth diapers work just fine at night. There were just a few times when it made sense to use the disposables at night, and we simply got into the habit. When we travel, we use disposables. When I go out in the day, I usually use disposables, but I do have two wet/dry bags so we can take cloth out. I did sadly once leave one of the Bumgeniuses in the BabiesRUs changing room and someone threw is out. (That’s an expensive disposable!) Because I was staying home, I found the washing and stuffing pretty do-able. Not sure it will be as easy once I go back to work. My thought is that we will do disposable at daycare and cloth at home. Daycare can’t dispose of solids or separate the inserts from the main part, so it would be a lot of gross work after I get home from work.

Oh — and the soap — we use Charlie’s Soap, which is great. Frankly, I’ve even started using it on our regular laundry. Once in a while, I did not to “strip” the diapers — wash them in extra hot water. Our washing machine does have a “sanitary” setting, and that’s what I’d use, and it easily did the trick. When I would do that, I would wash the diaper pail liner (we used Kissaluvs Antibacterial liners — 2, one for the wash, one in the pail) separately. When the diaper pail got really stinky, I’d sprinkle some baking soda in there.

I really wanted to buy our cloth diapers at a local store where they would help explain things, but the only one nearby went out of business. We bought a few diapers up in Northampton, MA at A Child’s Garden, but we bought the lion’s share at Kelly’s Closet online. We bought larger amounts so the prices would go down. I have to say — I think we saved a lot of money breastfeeding and cloth diapering this year!

Hope this helps! Leave a comment if you have diapering ideas and suggestions.