Cloth diaper adventures

So, since I first decided to cloth diaper, I have gotten tons of questions. The primary one being "Why would you do that?!" There are many answers to this question, and depending on where you are coming from, different angles to it. I made the choice to cloth diaper for several reasons, in the following order:

Economics-

It is just plain cheaper to cloth diaper a baby than it is to buy disposables. Knowing myself, and my children, I tend to buy more expensive brands of diapers because of sensitive skin issues. Until Bishop was potty training, he wore Huggies. When he was a size 3, I bought him the costco brand for a while...only to realize it is actually cheaper to buy Huggies...and went back to them. So I have never bought the store brand diapers, and I know that I wouldn't this time around either...even though I know better.

Cadence is a couple days shy of 4 months old. Depending on your baby's age, they go through diapers at different frequency's. Cadence is changed every 2 hours usually, unless she is sleeping. So, around 8-10 diapers a day...there abouts. Anyways, the point is, I bought the cloth diapers that we use for the price of about 2 months worth of disposables, and theortically, we would never need to buy diapers again...until she is potty trained. Think about that. Bishop is almost 3 and not fully-all-night-all-nap potty trained. So he uses 2 diapers a day. At 3!! So Cadence has years of diapers in her future. Diapers that are already bought and paid for.

So the economics behind it was the real selling factor for me, especially since I am staying home full time now. There are tons more things I can spend that extra $80 or so a month on.

The second thing, and this may seem silly, is cuteness...I think cloth diapers are so much cuter than disposables. How many disposables do you come across with Hello Kitty, music prints, or flowers on them? I mean, yeah, Mickey is cute...but we are all tired of the baby mickey prints on diapers. Been there, done that...bought the book, got the cd.

So they are all around cheaper and cuter...and third? Better for baby.

This actually might be more important than the cute thing, but that was the order they came to mind. So.

This might seem silly, but having a girl makes me...nervous. I have done the boy stuff. But baby girls...well...they have all different parts. What if I wipe wrong? (That was a big worry from the start) I am a girl. I know how to take care of...things. But its different when it's your baby! What if she gets a yeast infection!! What if....

Anyways, 4 months, and Cadence hasn't even had a diaper rash yet. By this point, Bishop had had thrush (which is a yeast infection for babies) and several diaper rashes, poor little guy. I do use cloth wipes, and make my own wipe solution that uses tea tree oil, which is good for bottoms, and protect against all that fun stuff.

CLOTH WIPES! you say. Indeed. Actually, I like them better than disposable ones. We actually still have disposable wipes around the house, because, well, they are so darn handy to wipe hands, faces...just about whatever. But when I am wiping a cloth diapered bottom, we use cloth wipes. Mainly, they are just so much easier. I take off diaper, wipe bottom, tuck wipe into diaper, toss diaper in pail. On wash day, I make sure all the inserts are out as they go in the wash...and thats it.

Sorry, but handling wipes just used to wipe up poop isn't really high on my favorite things list. And that's basically what was happening, because I would have to put them in a pile next to the diaper to go in the trash. Yuck. Anyways, I will post again about what kind of diapers we are actually using...since there are so many different kinds of cloth :)