Cloth Diapers - Minneapolis,MN

My advice to you is to use disposable diaper liners. If cost is an issue, they are cheap and you can cut them into two. Trust me when I tell you that diaper rinsing will be a much more tolerable experience. It's been 19 years since my cloth diapering days, and obviously, times have changed alot...but the removal process has not so the liners are worth checking out. Good luck.

Looks like you got a lot of great advice, I just have one thing to add...
Highly recommend purchasing the spray hose you attach to your toilet. We got ours at cottonbabies.com. It's about $30 and works great for cleaning the messy diapers, especially from a breastfed newborn.

One other note-WE LOVE USING CLOTH DIAPERS! We have actually had more leaks with disposables and it seems whenever she's in disposables she is more likely to get diaper rash. Good luck!
R.

I used a diaper service with my son, and it was great. It's not very expensive, especially compared to buying disposable. And depending on whether you plan to have more kids, you may not want to buy 50 cloth diapers that you'll have to store later. They're not exactly inexpensive to purchase, either. Plus, then you have to do all the washing yourself, and you pay for the water and detergent and bleach.

I did still use disposable diapers at night so that I wouldn't have to worry about leaking. And I do recommend the diaper covers that have velcro tabs, instead of having to use safety pins and rubber pants. I'm not sure where to buy them in stores, but you can order them online.

I used Cheek to Cheek diaper service. They had a deal where if you set up 4 weeks of service, then you got 2 weeks free. You could at least try it out, see if you even like using the cloth diapers, and either continue the service and/or buy your own. The service says you don't need to rinse the diapers out or anything, but I did just to keep the smell down a little. It wasn't bad, then.

We used cloth diapers until we had to start wrestling our son to get a diaper on. We were using a brand I think they got from Walmart (they were a gift) - just simple diapers - but there are more elaborate ones you can get off ebay. Instead of using diaper pins, you can use something called a snappi. That, too, you can get off ebay. We found that the cloth diapers leak easier, so we put disposables on overnight and on trips, and also when sick with diarrhea. You'll get used to them - go for it!

I use Fuzzi Bunz cloth diapers and have ben doing it for about a month (for the same reasons as you). I don't usually use them until after my daughter, who is 8 months old, has her BM of the day because I am not really into the whole cleaning up poop thing. I really like them for multiple reasons - they are really easy to use because they are an all in one cloth diaper (cheaper this way too since you don't need to buy covers), they are really soft, and my dughter gets bad diaper rash and she never does with these diapers. My daughter is "fluffy"; she weighs apprx. 21 pounds and we use the size mediums with room to spare. We use them with the Joey Bunz hemp inserts (which were a little spendier, but totally worth it). The detergent that Fuzzi Bunz recommends is a little spendy to me, so I use All Free and Clear when I wash them. If you have anyother questsion, please feel free to ask me.

-Becca-

I have a bunch of fitted diapers that were donated to my swap that nobody took, you could have them for free. I tried them with my first child and was mortified, but I am sure things would go different now! A note on the environment that I once read up on, the disposables take up landfill, the clothe ones use water in washing and water in disposing of the solid wastes at home, and sewage. Good luck! It's a great choice!

We did cloth diapers with Oliver - you'll find a ton of places sellling supplies online. We mainly used nice thick "prefolds" - those are the rectangular ones that you think of when you think of cloth diapers, though not the cheapie ones from Target. Find some nice ones online, you can buy them in packs of 10 or 20, I think.

Then you need some diaper covers - I'd recommend the Bummi's Whisper Wrap, they're not too expensive and wash really clean. You'll need about 8-12 covers, and I'd suggest you get them in a slightly larger size with elastic legs, so the baby can grow into them.

A lot of people also get a wool soaker diaper cover, esp. for at night. The wool is nice because it's soft and doesn't get too stinky, and the lanolin in it keeps it from leaking. I always doubled up the diaper at night. I know some people used disposables just at night, so the baby doesn't wake up from feeling wet.

Washing them was tricky - I'd usually run them through at least one extra rinse cycle, and put vinegar in the last rinse. That helps get them really clean.

OR, you could just go with a diaper service - though I'm not sure there's one around here. That makes it really easy!

Hi S.. I've used Fuzzi Bunz since my 1.5 year old was 2 months old, and I really like them. They're insert-type diapers, so they have a waterproof exterior, then you've got your cloth insert, and the layer touching your child's skin is some other material that doesn't ever feel very wet. They're just as good as disposables in holding most pee and poop in, but we buy disposables when there's diarrhea.

Each Fuzzi Bunz is ~$15 (not including the insert) but you can buy them for cheaper on Ebay. I have 24, and I wash them about every three days.I think having your own washer and dryer is a must with fuzzi bunz. I put them through three wash cycles, and air dry the diapers (the cloth inserts can go into the dryer). It sounds like a lot of work, but it's not really.

If you do get Fuzzi Bunz, make sure you get the right size. I decided to buy a couple of larges, and they're still too big for my 50th percentile boy.

Hi S..
I would suggest that you check out the article "The Benefits of Cloth Diapering" in the August 2006 issue of HEALTHY BEGINNINGS, a holistic resource magazine, published in Long Lake, MN. Their website is www.myhealthybeginning.com. For a copy of the August publication, you may want to contact the editor, Nichi Hirsch-Keuchle at ____@____.com, in that publication are some ads from cloth diaper providers such as The Natural Life Store. Good Luck!

Hi,

I had a diaper service for the first three or four months and I really like it. Once we started to take her out more the disposable worked much better. The service picked up the diapers once a week, no need to rinse them just toss in a bag and then they drop off more. I just needed to call if we needed a bigger size or an increase or decrease on amount. The plastic pants that went over it were nice because they were velcrow. I can't remember the name of the service though, sorry.

Happy Bambino 'happybambino.com' on Atwood Avenue is a great resource for cloth diapers. They offer a FREE course Cloth Diaper 101 which helped me sort through the myriad of information.

We started off with Mother Natures Diaper service ###-###-#### or 'www.mothernaturesdiapers.com' for the cloth diapers but purchased the wraps so that we can reuse them with future kids. I had thought that I would purchase and launder our own diapers after a three month trial, but the service is so WONDERFUL that we've stuck with it.

You'll find that there are so many options to choose from. We're happy with the following: Mother Nature's Diaper Service, Classic ProRap Velcro Diaper Covers, and Snappies. The Snappie keeps the cloth diaper in place so that you can easily put the ProRap on without the cloth diaper coming undone - vital now that our daughter is very sqirmy on the changing table.

My husband was very pesimistic in the beginning but now he's vocal about how easy cloth diapers are to use!!!

Good Luck!

We LOVE cloth diapering!!!! I started when DD was 9 months old, so I don't have a lot of advice about newborns...sorry! We use pocket diapers (Happy Heinys, Fuzzi Bunz, bumGenius, some WAHM brands...) and they are fantastic! I never got the hang of prefolds/wraps. Pockets and All-in-Ones are very, very easy since they mimic a disposable in look and fit. All the washing that goes with it is so minimal (about 3 extra loads a week) that along with all my other laundry, it hardly matters. :)

PeaPods in St. Paul is a good place to start, since you can see the diapers in person. They have a limited selection, though. I found all of my information off of a website called www.DiaperSwappers.com. You don't have to join to look at the posts, only to respond. The women there are sooo knowledgeable, it's crazy.

Good Luck! It seems overwhelming at first, but once you get the hang of it, it's really not a big deal at all. We are a 100% cloth family (even naps, bedtime and out of the house...which are the most scary when you first start)...I do have disposables around for the grandparents and babysitters though. Don't want to scare them away!

Enjoy your newborn!

I see lots of responses for you so to keep it short and sweet...my sister-in-law and her best friend are using Fuzzi Bunz. The website www.fuzzibunz.com brings you to a natural babies website where you can search for the Fuzzi Bunz diapers. Good luck.

We use Cheek to Cheek diaper service and love it.
Karey

I had my daughter in cloth diapers for a year and then when my son was born I just started using disposables (to much laundry). I have found that the chinese cloth diapers work really well sepcialy at night then with a prorap diaper cover... I have tried the all in ones but if your child has larger legs then they don't fit really well.. I agree with Peapods in St. Paul they are wonderful and the delivery is fairly fast if you order on line they also have a lot of helpful info on the web site.

I love cloth diapers and actually have found the opposite regarding leaking. I purchased diaper service quality diapers from Diaperaps. I found them on the internet. I also went the old fashioned route of pins and plastic pants. Plastic pants in small sizes were hard to come by because most people use wraps now. Depending on where you are located, you may be able to consider a diaper service. That is really a luxury. We had a service for my second child.
It is really no big deal to wash diapers, etc... and there is something comforting to me about nice clean cotton vs. paper and chemicals on their bottoms. ~~W.