Cloth Diapered Booty!

So, I love cloth diapering. I really do. And seriously there is nothing quite as cute as a cloth diapered baby booty... so fluffy. When I was pregnant with Luke the whole idea of putting a diaper on a baby totally freaked me out and I had no idea who to do it. I quickly learned. When I was pregnant with Emma, I thought briefly about cloth diapering, but after researching it, I quickly became overwhelmed. So many different options for diapering a booty. So I didn't do it. With Isaac, family and friends stocked us up with disposable diapers for the first 8 weeks of his life. As the stash of diapers we were given began to dwindle, I really started to research this whole cloth diaper concept. I am becoming a bit "crunchier" the older I get. Though I still don't consider myself  "crunchy," rather a "soggy granola." haha. So many reasons to cloth diaper... much more cost effective and better for baby's booty. A bonus is that I've heard cloth diapered babies' potty train more quickly. we'll see though... both Luke and Emma potty trained pretty quickly.

After researching this time, I began to get overwhelmed again. If you don't know the cloth diaper "lingo" it can be quite intimidating. So I decided to talk to my cousin Hillary who had cloth diapered her little girl. She was done cloth diapering and offer me her diapers!  She had prefolds and 2 covers. This was a great start for me. I practiced for about a week and loved it. So much less intimidating when you just do it instead of reading about it. :)

So at this point, I decided I needed some more diaper covers. It was so much fun to shop for them... so many cute colors and patterns to cover baby's booty. I bought 3 size 1 covers and 4 size 2 covers. This has been plenty so far. Hillary had LOTS of prefolds, so I haven't had to buy those yet. I also decided to use the BUMGENIUS 4.0 pocket diapers for nighttime diapering and "on the go" diapering and these are quicker and easier to change... much like a disposables. I bought six of them. So my overall expense thus far has been about $120, thanks to Hillary who supplied me with the prefolds. I am certain I've already made my money back at this point. As Isaac gets older I hope to buy some more BUMGENIUS as well. As I  know they will be easier to change as Isaac get squirmier.

As far as storing the diapers I am just using a wetbag for now... and I am not rinsing them. He is still exclusively breastfed, so the diapers aren't stinky yet. This will change soon though with the introduction of solids. I also have a couple small wetbags for our "on the go" cloth diapering.  I usually wash diaper every day or sometimes every other day.

During this process I have also decided to make my own homemade reusable wipes. I've seen several recipes on Pinerest as well as a friend posting one on her blog. Using those as guidelines I came up with my own concoction and it is working great! No chemicals on my Isaac's booty! :)  I cut up one oversized receiving blanket. (Ideally you want to sew along the edges, but I can't sew and don't own a sewing machine- guess that should be my next adventure!) Put those in a bowl. Then in a separate bowl add one cup water, some olive olive (maybe a tbsp), a few drops tea tea oil, then I add a few drops of melaleuca oil, and a few drops of melaleuca soap. Mix these ingredients and pour over blanket pieces. These wipes last about 1-2 weeks then I wash all of them using cloth diaper detergent and remake. It was worked wonderfully.

As far as diaper rash goes, there is A LOT less of it. He did break out once and I knew I couldn't do traditional diaper creams with cloth, so I asked my cloth diapering friends on FACEBOOK and found that coconut oil work for diaper rash. So I've used that as well as my Zija oil. 

I seriously love cloth diapering! We've had many successful trips out while cloth diapering, as well as a long weekend trip to St. Louis where we used cloth the whole time. Super cute diapers, no chemical filled diapers and wipes, less leaks, less diaper rash... so far so good.  My next project is homemade baby food... more on that later. :)