Money, Money, Money...Moneyyyyyyyyyyyyyy!
Let's talk about saving money ladies! Cloth Diapers are where its at!
IF, IF you can control your spending. (there are a LOT of CUTE cloth diapers out there) You aren't an extreme couponer (they probably get their disposables for free) You make smart choices (there are a lot of expensive cloth diapers out there, please for the love of all that is holy remember that this is catching your kids poop, I'm just sayin)
For us, we spent about $500 on everything we needed to cloth diaper all 3 of our little ones. And we bought mostly new. We did get some of our newborn covers used bc they don't last long but all of our prefolds were knew as well as our liners, wetbag, detergent, accessories, thirsties covers, etc. My favorite local cloth diaper store, Green Bambino broke it down like this!
"Babies average 6-12 diaper changes per day. They'll go through more diapers daily as newborns and fewer as they get older. Let's assume the following:
8 changes per day x 30 cents per diaper x 365 days x 2.5 years = $2,190 for disposable diapers
Two and a half years is a fairly conservative estimate for how long toddlers will be in diapers and will vary depending on gender, firstborn child or younger sibling, etc. This number doesn't include the cost of wipes (about $500), rash creams, or the trash bags you'll need to get the diapers to the curb. It's reasonable to estimate a family will spend $1,000 on disposable diapers and other items for each year a child is in diapers.
Cloth diaper start up cost = $200-$500 (many diapers will last for multiple children)
SAVINGS over disposables = approximately $2000-$2500. This number increases if these cloth diapers are used for multiple children or if the cloth diapers are sold and part of the initial investment is recouped."
So if you go with the averages we are saving THOUSANDS of dollars by using cloth diapers. Is it worth dealing with poop? It is for me! But I am one cheap mama :)
Always,
Jesi
Showing posts with label Cloth Diapers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Cloth Diapers. Show all posts
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Cloth Diapering 3 under 2-Part 3 Laundry
It's a poopy job but somebody has to do it.
Here's my take on poop and diapers.
Poop is poop. No matter how you deal with poop, it's still poop and it's still gross. It's POOP.
So how is cloth diapering and dealing with poop?
Well, If you have a tiny baby and they are breastfed it is water soluable and not that much in quanity after the first couple weeks so you just throw the whole diaper or insert or prefold in the diaper pail and wash. No big deal. If they are formula fed like my tinies then they say you need to get most of the poop off before you wash. I don't breastfeed but even if I did, I would want to get most of the poop off anyways!
So when I change a pee diaper I put on a new cover and prefold. I take the dirty prefold still in the cover and toss the prefold into our diaper pail in the laundry room. I hang the cover up and let it air out to use again (so long as its not poopy, obviously!) Now when its poop, I take it into the bathroom and use a wipe (I use disposable wipes although there are cloth wipes and merits to both!) to toss the poop into the toilet and flush. less stink and less poop ya know? Again, take it to the pail and wash when ready. It's REALLY not that big of a deal, like I said Poop is Poop.
Diaper Pail-there are some crazy people out there who spend big bucks on a "special cloth diaper pail" Yeah whatever. Anything that traps air like a diaper genie or a special pail gets STINKY FAST! Gross! I use a flip lid tall trash can ($9) with a Planet Wise Pail Liner ($19) I have two liners. Everytime I wash diapers I wash the liner that was being used. To keep my pail FRESH I mix baking soda and a few drops of Young Living Oils Lavendar Essential Oil and sprinkle it in the bottom of the pail and liner. Thats just optional and smells nice!
Am I a cloth diaper freak and a disposable hater? Heck NO! I used disposables on Max and Stella and still use them on all 4 kids. Because I CD to save money I try really hard not to buy diapers. But we were given tons as gifts so yes, we use them! We don't impose our cloth diapering onto the nursery workers at church or the teachers at Mothers Day Out. We use disposables. If we are out and about a LOT we use disposables. If 4 kids are screaming at me and I grab a disposable, I use a disposable! Can you tell I am laid back about this people?
As for WASHING! This is why cloth diapering made me a laudry freak...I stay on top of my laundry. If you know me, you know thats kind of a big deal. MANY people wash their diapers every few days. I am sort of freakish about it and wash every day or every other day. It take 1 minute to throw a load in and nothing is easier to put away than diapers. Because I am always doing laundry I stay on top of all my other laundry too!
If you are looking into cloth diapers you might see a lot of complicated wash routines. Mine is not. But I use all cotton and hemp so natural fibers that clean easier. Our covers are PUL but they can take a laundry beating too!
I use the dial on my washer (we have a top loader btw) to go to the Cold Rinse/Hot Wash option. This cold rinse gets rid of the residue on the diapers and hot wash is sanitary. Ours does not get SUPER hot so I don't worry about my covers getting damaged. I throw in some original tide powder (this is discontinued so we will switch to original tide liquid) and let the water dissolve it. Then I throw in everything in the pail, being sure to stick down my velcro on my covers really well. That's it. When its done, I hang the covers to dry and toss all the diapers in the dryer. It's really not hard. And like I said, laundry is a poopy job but somebody has to do it.
For the record, I find dealing with your average stomach bug and vomit FAR grosser than dealing with cloth diapers!
Here's my take on poop and diapers.
Poop is poop. No matter how you deal with poop, it's still poop and it's still gross. It's POOP.
So how is cloth diapering and dealing with poop?
Well, If you have a tiny baby and they are breastfed it is water soluable and not that much in quanity after the first couple weeks so you just throw the whole diaper or insert or prefold in the diaper pail and wash. No big deal. If they are formula fed like my tinies then they say you need to get most of the poop off before you wash. I don't breastfeed but even if I did, I would want to get most of the poop off anyways!
So when I change a pee diaper I put on a new cover and prefold. I take the dirty prefold still in the cover and toss the prefold into our diaper pail in the laundry room. I hang the cover up and let it air out to use again (so long as its not poopy, obviously!) Now when its poop, I take it into the bathroom and use a wipe (I use disposable wipes although there are cloth wipes and merits to both!) to toss the poop into the toilet and flush. less stink and less poop ya know? Again, take it to the pail and wash when ready. It's REALLY not that big of a deal, like I said Poop is Poop.
Diaper Pail-there are some crazy people out there who spend big bucks on a "special cloth diaper pail" Yeah whatever. Anything that traps air like a diaper genie or a special pail gets STINKY FAST! Gross! I use a flip lid tall trash can ($9) with a Planet Wise Pail Liner ($19) I have two liners. Everytime I wash diapers I wash the liner that was being used. To keep my pail FRESH I mix baking soda and a few drops of Young Living Oils Lavendar Essential Oil and sprinkle it in the bottom of the pail and liner. Thats just optional and smells nice!
Am I a cloth diaper freak and a disposable hater? Heck NO! I used disposables on Max and Stella and still use them on all 4 kids. Because I CD to save money I try really hard not to buy diapers. But we were given tons as gifts so yes, we use them! We don't impose our cloth diapering onto the nursery workers at church or the teachers at Mothers Day Out. We use disposables. If we are out and about a LOT we use disposables. If 4 kids are screaming at me and I grab a disposable, I use a disposable! Can you tell I am laid back about this people?
As for WASHING! This is why cloth diapering made me a laudry freak...I stay on top of my laundry. If you know me, you know thats kind of a big deal. MANY people wash their diapers every few days. I am sort of freakish about it and wash every day or every other day. It take 1 minute to throw a load in and nothing is easier to put away than diapers. Because I am always doing laundry I stay on top of all my other laundry too!
If you are looking into cloth diapers you might see a lot of complicated wash routines. Mine is not. But I use all cotton and hemp so natural fibers that clean easier. Our covers are PUL but they can take a laundry beating too!
I use the dial on my washer (we have a top loader btw) to go to the Cold Rinse/Hot Wash option. This cold rinse gets rid of the residue on the diapers and hot wash is sanitary. Ours does not get SUPER hot so I don't worry about my covers getting damaged. I throw in some original tide powder (this is discontinued so we will switch to original tide liquid) and let the water dissolve it. Then I throw in everything in the pail, being sure to stick down my velcro on my covers really well. That's it. When its done, I hang the covers to dry and toss all the diapers in the dryer. It's really not hard. And like I said, laundry is a poopy job but somebody has to do it.
For the record, I find dealing with your average stomach bug and vomit FAR grosser than dealing with cloth diapers!
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Cloth Diapering 3 under 2-Part Two
Okie doke...now you know we are closet freaks who cloth diaper. I kid, I kid. Cloth Diapering does not make you a closet freak. It makes you a laundry freak.
Our stash of diapers is for 3 kids. Stella is 15 months old, Presley and Jackson are 2 months old at the time of this post. Max is still in a pullup at night but is otherwise potty trained. As I said in my previous post we use prefolds and covers.
The twins stash is sized for them and includes
OsoCozy Better Fit prefolds-purple edge
Our stash of diapers is for 3 kids. Stella is 15 months old, Presley and Jackson are 2 months old at the time of this post. Max is still in a pullup at night but is otherwise potty trained. As I said in my previous post we use prefolds and covers.
The twins stash is sized for them and includes
OsoCozy Better Fit prefolds-purple edge
photo from osocozy
These are my favorite prefolds for small babies. Because...well they are small prefolds! So they don't cause a huge fluffy butt when you put them on. These are shorter than regular prefolds so they just fit better. Hence the name, better fits.
Imagine green edge prefolds from Nicki's Diapers-Size Small
These are a little bit bigger and bulkier than the OsoCozy's but they still work and the bonus is they work GREAT on Stella as well. I have 48 of these...enough to wash every 3 days or longer. But like I said I am now a laundry freak so I wash daily or every other day, by choice not by neccesity.
For Covers we LOVE our Thirsties Covers!
We have several sized Thirsties X-Smalls that worked great when we first started the twins (around 4 weeks) and several Thirsties Duo Wraps Size One. I definitely love them and prefer aplix for small babies!
We also have Bummis Super Whisper Wraps, again in Aplix (otherwise known in normal land as velcro). We like these as well and they fit great, no leaks.
Each twin has a cute newborn size Rump-a-Rooz cover. These would work great for a tiny baby. Jackson already outgrew his but he is a hoss :) Presley can still wear hers!
Now for Stella, we again use our Thirsties Covers and really like them! We have all velcro and YES she has hit the age where she can undo them. After one VERY poopy incident (literally) we realized that she HAS to wear snaps at naptime or bedtime. Both disposables and velcro cloth diapers come off too easy for Ms.Houdini. So we use our Econobums covers a lot and they are by far the best cheap cover out there in my opinion. I love mine. I can already snap them down and use them on the twins as well since they are a one-size cover.
Stella has some nicer prefolds from Thirsties that are the Duo Hemp Prefolds. I sort of splurged on them because they are a little bit more $ but they are SO soft and VERY absorbent. She has 18 of the prefolds and a ton of different covers but the twins will grow into those covers and use them as well!
Again we just fold the prefold into a trifold and lay it in the cover and then velcro on the baby. Shown below is an Osocozy red edge better fit which is one size higher than the purple edges we own!
I think I will make washing a seperate post since this is so long already!
Always,
Jesi
The cloth diaper closet freak
Thursday, June 23, 2011
Cloth Diapering 3 under 2-Part One
One of the weirdest decisions we made when we found out we were having twins was the decision to cloth diaper. In fact people generally think we are bananas for even considering it. But let me tell you WHY we cloth diaper. We cloth diaper about 3/4 of the time because we are cheap. That's right folks, no green eco reasoning here. Let's just say being eco-friendly and "green" is not at the top of my priority list. And that's ok! Everyone makes decisions for different reasons and money was hands down the reason why we decided to cloth diaper Jackson and Presley.
While we were researching it we decided to first take the plunge with Stella. And honestly it's not that big of a deal if you pick out the TYPE of cloth diaper that really works best for you and your family! When Max was around a year old I tried out some cloth diapers with him and was not a fan. I was using pocket diapers, which are basically just like a disposable but there is an insert you stuff inside that is absorbent. Both the diaper and the insert are washable, not disposable. Not a fan of pocket diapers here! They are VERY popular and a great option for many but I hated stuffing them and you have to be fairly aware of HOW you wash them. Many of them have microfiber which is more prone to stink issues so that is why the wash routine is important.
When money was really tight I had a moment where I considered trying cloth diapering again. I knew I didn't want to try pockets again...I wanted something EASY, CHEAP and EASY TO WASH. That was most important to me. I talked to a few friends who cloth diapered their twins and a friend who actually owns a cloth diaper store online. After researching I decided to go with prefolds and covers.
Prefolds are old school diapers. The cotton kind you used to pin on and everything. Don't go buy gerber ones from Babies R Us though, they stink! Now its still a LOT different and easier than back in the day. Most of the time I do a trifold and put it in the cover. Its really that easy, you fold the prefold into 3'rds and lay it in the cover. Then the cover goes on just like a disposable. There are TONS of prefold options out there, sized, standard, bleached, unbleached, blah de blah. Since I am not a fan of a HUGE fluffy butt we went with sized prefolds and a variety of covers. Next up I will talk about the kind we decided to buy, cost savings and washing....yeah washing. I know you are wondering, what do you do about poop?
And on that awesome note, gotta go take care of some babies!
Always,
Jesi
While we were researching it we decided to first take the plunge with Stella. And honestly it's not that big of a deal if you pick out the TYPE of cloth diaper that really works best for you and your family! When Max was around a year old I tried out some cloth diapers with him and was not a fan. I was using pocket diapers, which are basically just like a disposable but there is an insert you stuff inside that is absorbent. Both the diaper and the insert are washable, not disposable. Not a fan of pocket diapers here! They are VERY popular and a great option for many but I hated stuffing them and you have to be fairly aware of HOW you wash them. Many of them have microfiber which is more prone to stink issues so that is why the wash routine is important.
When money was really tight I had a moment where I considered trying cloth diapering again. I knew I didn't want to try pockets again...I wanted something EASY, CHEAP and EASY TO WASH. That was most important to me. I talked to a few friends who cloth diapered their twins and a friend who actually owns a cloth diaper store online. After researching I decided to go with prefolds and covers.
Prefolds are old school diapers. The cotton kind you used to pin on and everything. Don't go buy gerber ones from Babies R Us though, they stink! Now its still a LOT different and easier than back in the day. Most of the time I do a trifold and put it in the cover. Its really that easy, you fold the prefold into 3'rds and lay it in the cover. Then the cover goes on just like a disposable. There are TONS of prefold options out there, sized, standard, bleached, unbleached, blah de blah. Since I am not a fan of a HUGE fluffy butt we went with sized prefolds and a variety of covers. Next up I will talk about the kind we decided to buy, cost savings and washing....yeah washing. I know you are wondering, what do you do about poop?
And on that awesome note, gotta go take care of some babies!
Always,
Jesi
Saturday, October 17, 2009
Oooooohhh exciting!
I got some fun news. I might be able to try out Grobaby cloth diapers. These are TOO cool because they combine the easiest and best parts of cloth diapers. An outer shell is washable and reusable like a cloth diaper but their NEW Bio Soakers are disposable inserts that go inside the diaper with adhesive tabs. This is just like a disposable because you don't have to wash the YUCK part of diapers! Just take out the dirty insert and toss it. Then you put in a new Bio Soaker and you are good to go.
The www.thenaturalbabyco.com is offering bloggers the chance to try the system for FREE so hopefully I will get a chance. I haven't gotten to try out Grobaby's yet but I have heard great things about them from friends. And we know I am all about a deal!
The Bio Soakers come in a box of 50 for $19.99. They come in 2 sizes and appear to have elastic like gathers along the sides. Just this week, GroBaby also started selling an Introductory Package that includes the box of 50 inserts and one vanilla shell. The introductory package is available for $34.95.
Grobaby's also come in fun colors like the green in the above picture and this yummy eggplant color. Pretty.
See how the inner shell works? Now if you still think I am crazy for the cloth diapering thing maybe these seem a little bit easier!
Jesi
The www.thenaturalbabyco.com is offering bloggers the chance to try the system for FREE so hopefully I will get a chance. I haven't gotten to try out Grobaby's yet but I have heard great things about them from friends. And we know I am all about a deal!
The Bio Soakers come in a box of 50 for $19.99. They come in 2 sizes and appear to have elastic like gathers along the sides. Just this week, GroBaby also started selling an Introductory Package that includes the box of 50 inserts and one vanilla shell. The introductory package is available for $34.95.
Grobaby's also come in fun colors like the green in the above picture and this yummy eggplant color. Pretty.
See how the inner shell works? Now if you still think I am crazy for the cloth diapering thing maybe these seem a little bit easier!
Jesi
Wednesday, October 14, 2009
Diapers that rock
You are going to think I am crazy.
But I started experimenting with cloth diapers. I know, I know you are thinking WHY would you mess with that? Poop and washing and hassle? But cloth diapers are SOOO much different than the ones you are imagining in your head!
Pocket diapers and All In Ones are super easy and super cute, toss in the wash and you are saving a LOAD of money, with just an extra load of laundry. I'm leaning towards really investing for baby#2 on the way.
Still don't believe me? Check out my friend Erin's new store!
But I started experimenting with cloth diapers. I know, I know you are thinking WHY would you mess with that? Poop and washing and hassle? But cloth diapers are SOOO much different than the ones you are imagining in your head!
Pocket diapers and All In Ones are super easy and super cute, toss in the wash and you are saving a LOAD of money, with just an extra load of laundry. I'm leaning towards really investing for baby#2 on the way.
Still don't believe me? Check out my friend Erin's new store!
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