Cloth Diapers

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Anyone use cloth diapers? Did it save a lot of money?

I am thinking of pushing forward and doing it. I gave in to my DH and did disposables because he never even changed a diaper before. And refused to do it. And my mom came and helped and she refused as well.

So we got a ton of free diapers as gifts and I had a huge stockpile of nearly free disposables I got before birth. Well now, I'm almost out, and I'm thinking of trying some cloth diapers.

I bought 3 on ebay for $5 each AIO with inserts. What are people's thoughts or experiences? Is it worth it?

[Joan.of.the.Arch]

If you have a washer and also use the liners, I don't see that it is a big deal to change and wash cloth diapers.

[ThriftoRama]

I use Happy Heiny's one size washables. LOVE them. They last for years, are easy to wash, and easy to use. I highly recommend them. They have saved us a lot of money. It's worth it, and really, the one load of extra laundry a day isn't cumbersome.

[MonkeyMama]

I can't speak from experience (we used a diaper service to rent/wash the diapers - wasn't to save money), but I have to agree with the others. It's really no biggie.

Two other points:

1 - Start small. Cloth diapering doesn't always work out. We found my youngest slept much better with disposables, so not sure we ever used enough cloth to really save much money. A lot of my friends wanted to do cloth, but couldn't due to skin sensitivty (or vice versa - sounds funny to say since the disposables can also be very irritating to some babies. But the switching tends to go both ways). I just share before you invest in a lifetime supple of diapers.

2 - You'll probably save tons of money and frustration with the clothe - the kids tend to potty train much younger and easier. I was skeptical because I think the diaper service touted average potty training at age 2 versus 3. BUT, with time, I do feel our kids were miles ahead the average kid today (fully potty trained age 4/5/6 - mine were done at 3 with little effort). So yeah, I remember not being impressed at the time. But every day I Talk to someone with a 5-year-old with potty issues. Something I haven't given a thought to since my kids turned 3! Haven't rented or bought any type diaper in years, whereas most our friends are still knee deep in pull ups. Maybe there is something to it. (Though the younger one wore less clothe, he has less tolerance for diapers, in general!)

[TBH]

We lived in an apartment and had to walk several blocks to the laundromat when our son was a baby, so we used a cloth diaper service. Like MM's youngest, my son didn't sleep as well in cloth. He also went to daycare part time so we used disposables there. After a while we just weren't using the cloth as much as we had expected to.

I think if I had a washer/dryer at home, and if I wasn't using daycare, I would totally go with cloth. I agree with MM that you should get a few to start with and see if you like it.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

I bought 3 all in ones to start out with. I have been using the flushable/compostable gdiapers. But it's expensive and it leaks! Not good. Not sure if I should try the $20 AIO Grobaby, which a neighbor uses.

The three i bought were $5 each and I figured we'd start testing it out.

[PrincessPerky]

I tried cloth with my third, hated them.

Tried the insert kind with my 4th, found it quite easy.

If you are already dealing with the flushing of waste, you will prolly not find cloth any harder.

But make sure whatever cloth you get is sewn well. I had a couple that worked really well, snug around the thighs, and a couple that really didn't work well at all, the thighs were not sewn snug, so they leaked.

Just like with disposable you need to find the kind that fit your kids butt, but unlike disposable you have to pay a good deal more to find out.

In the end I think the cost was about the same for the one kid, but now that we are having another we will prolly save.

[Gleeen]

PrincessPerky nailed it.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

I bought a couple and will test drive it.

[geojen]

I have an 18 mo old son and twin 6-week old girls, and we use cloth diapers, always have. They are easy, cloth wipes are AWESOME and we save tons of money. Now, my son does sleep in a disposable, that is only 1 diaper a day, so that is no big deal. I get all my dipes from greenmountaindiapers.com. It is a great site with a TON of info on it, so if you are looking for more information on how to do cloth, this is the site. We use the green mountain fitteds for my son, and plain old prefolds with my girls. Both are easy and have their pros and cons. You will definitely save more money using cloth if you don't use AIOs, because they are the most expensive.

[jaystone]

We've been using cloth diapers with our first born for about 9 months (he just turned 1). I was a bit reluctant at first, but my wife talked me into it and it honestly hasn't been that bad. We have a bunch of different kinds with inserts (happy heiny's, rumparoos, smarty pants, and bum genious flip diapers). The happy heiny's and flip diapers seem to work best, but all take a bit of adjusting to find the right size. The kinds with snaps seem to hold up better over the long run than the ones with velcro, plus I am hoping that our son won't be able to unsnap them very easily. They also seemed to work better as our son grew and filled out more (fewer leaks). Definitely get some sort of liner for #2's (we use the bio soft liners from bummis and so far so good with our septic system). I won't lie, things were at times a bit gross until our son started eating more solids, but if you're already flushing it shouldn't be much worse I suppose. We do use disposables at night as doubling the liners at night made the diapers too bulky. We also use them whenever we take him somewhere to avoid having to carry around soiled diapers. Still, we very rarely buy disposable diapers (maybe one giant package from our local BJ's wholesale club every few months).

[zakity]

We used disposables when they were little and cloth when they got older. We also didn't have a wash machine or dryer at the apartment where we lived. Once they were pottying on more of a schedule and they were aware of being wet (yearish old), I started putting them in cloth diapers when we were home. Of course, my guys are older and we had the plastic/vinyl pants and diaper pins type of diapers. Beak was potty trained at 27 months and the twins were about 30 to 33 months. The twins really both were at 30 months, but they pulled a twin card. One twin would absolutely refuse to use the potty and they switched back and forth on which twin was the one who was refusing.

A friend uses elimination communication, cloth diapers (mixture of AIO's and the kind where they snap up and you need a woolie/cover), and disposables. She uses the disposables when the baby is sleeping because he sleeps better. She goes through like a pack of diapers a month. If he wakes up and diaper is still empty, she uses it the next night.

I will tell you what, those snappy diaper things are awfully cool. The woolies are way cool too! Way better than the pins and plastic pants. But, you know, with the pins, it only took a time or two of you accidently poking them for them to figure out that laying still is less painful. It definately got the diaper changes over faster when it involved pins.

[Wringer-Washer]

We used disposables when they were little and cloth when they got older. We also didn't have a wash machine or dryer at the apartment where we lived. Once they were pottying on more of a schedule and they were aware of being wet (yearish old), I started putting them in cloth diapers when we were home. Of course, my guys are older and we had the plastic/vinyl pants and diaper pins type of diapers. Beak was potty trained at 27 months and the twins were about 30 to 33 months. The twins really both were at 30 months, but they pulled a twin card. One twin would absolutely refuse to use the potty and they switched back and forth on which twin was the one who was refusing.

A friend uses elimination communication, cloth diapers (mixture of AIO's and the kind where they snap up and you need a woolie/cover), and disposables. She uses the disposables when the baby is sleeping because he sleeps better. She goes through like a pack of diapers a month. If he wakes up and diaper is still empty, she uses it the next night.

I will tell you what, those snappy diaper things are awfully cool. The woolies are way cool too! Way better than the pins and plastic pants. But, you know, with the pins, it only took a time or two of you accidently poking them for them to figure out that laying still is less painful. It definately got the diaper changes over faster when it involved pins.

I 100% agree. All but two of my kids suffered the same consequence, and all quickly learned to lay still when I was wielding pins at change time.