Cloth Diapers

Why we do it: I was totally against cloth diapers when we first had Lucy, unlike Pete who was surprisingly open to the idea. In fact, we didn't get in to them until she was over a year old if I remember correctly. Part of that was that for her first year of life, we were traveling a lot, in other people's homes.

Eventually, after seeing a friend do it while staying in her house and realizing it wasn't that hard, we went for it.

Our number one reason is probably that its cheaper. Also, I enjoy the idea that I'm not just adding tons of disposable diapers to landfills. Plus, it's kind of fun. And its really not that hard.

What we do: We take a pretty flexible approach, trying to use cloth as much as we can, even out sometimes, but always feeling the freedom to use a disposable if we want to or need to: when we're out of town, church, when babysitters are over sometimes, during the night (I didn't bother to get in to the nighttime cloth diapers), and sometimes when I just forget to wash the cloth ones...

We use Best Bottom Diapers. There are tons of cloth diaper brands these days. I like Best Bottom because of the snaps which you can adjust to any size child who wears diapers, the leg gussets which rarely leak, and they're easy to wash. Adam wears the same diapers now that he wore in his first week home from the hospital as an infant. (They have different sized inserts for different weight categories.) The website is bestbottomdiapers.com for more info.

Adam at 1 or 2 months

We usually go through 4 or 5 diapers per day with Adam now that he's older (it was at least 8 per day when he was born and Lucy was still wearing them at that point too.) After a diaper is soiled, I unsnap the insert and throw it in the wet bag. If its number two, I dump it in the toilet and then put it in the wet bag. If the outer shell is still clean I might reuse it with a new insert once or twice- this is usually if its just a wet diaper.

After two or three days (because I have only one child in diapers now and we have accumulated quite a few), I wash them. (I'll probably be washing them every night when the new baby comes). I do a lot of laundry anyways, so it doesn't seem like a huge burden. First, everything is rinsed with cold water twice. Then washed with soap in hot water (and that's when I add other things that need to be washed such as sheets, towels, kitchen rags, and the occasional needed clothing item.) Then we usually line-dry the outer shells, and throw the inserts in the dryer.