Monday, July 27, 2009

Cloth Diaper Carnival....What I wish I knew


A while back I joined ClothDiaper Blogs this week we are having our very first Cloth Diaper Carnival!

The theme is "What do you wish you knew then that you know now? Meaning, now that you have experienced cloth first hand, what would you have told yourself when you first started or before you started?"

Well, there are so many things that I wish I had known a LONG time ago. The very first thing that comes to mind, is that I wish I had known how EASY it could be to use cloth diapers. Melanie is my 6th child and she was 14 months old before I made the switch.

Then from a practical standpoint, the biggest thing I wish I had known about when I was initially purchasing cloth diapers is that modern isn't always better. My initial purchase was for about $50 at a local clothdiaper store. Those first diapers I purchased were not very absorbent and are now my least favorites. As I built my stash, I purchased a variety of brands trying to figure out what worked best for my baby. If I were to start a stash now, I would first purchase a dozen Diaper Service Quality prefolds and 3 Thirsties covers....that is easily a full day & night supply for my daughter. I avoided prefolds for a long time because I didn't realize just how BIG & THICK they are & what a great value. The local diaper store has the Premium size for just $2 each. They are not my very favorite diaper, but they are economical, easy to care for & efficient. They are also very similar to the old fashioned cloth diapers my Mom used on me when I was a baby in the 1960's.

I would still want fitted diapers & pocket diapers to round out my stash, but I would have been able to cloth diaper my baby full time from the beginning and I probably wouldn't have almost a day worth of diapers that I try hard to never need.

Do you or did you clothdiaper your baby? Are you considering using cloth diapers in the future? Feel free to write your own post about what you wish you had known before starting to cloth diaper & link up!! Follow the links below for more great Cloth Diaper tips & tricks other Moms wish they had known when they first started out and don't forget to share your thoughts in the comments.


5 comments:

Upstatemamma said...

I am really enjoying reading these because we all like so many different things. Unfortunately, that makes it harder for other first time arond mamas - no one is wrong and where do they start? :)

dirtydiaperlaundry.com said...

Sometimes I do like to good ol' prefolds! I wish I had realized they weren't evil. I just used crummy ones so I had a bad experience. Now I use prefolds sometimes, but I ose OBV ones and pretty embellished ones. Hey, I still have to have drool worthy prefolds!

Jessie Kaitlin said...

I love having prefolds! Even if we were to buy other types, using prefolds really helps to keep the cost down, and they work well! I've never had to use anything but a prefold at nap/night time, super absorbent!

Ammieloris said...

Yes, prefolds have their value. They can be soooo soft! If my son had a regular schedule, I could probably use them more without any concerns of messes. (My husband LOVES them.) I enjoyed your story about getting started with cloth diapers!

Anonymous said...

I used a prefold service for the first 5 months of my son's life - it was all I knew! I tried making my own, but that was a bust, lol.

Practicing EC, I have the luxury I guess of less washing and more to spend on pretty trainers.

I must admit to basically putting any old cloth inside my two covers - be it a flannel or a washcloth. Does the job.

Charndra