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| My
Diapering Experience |
The Beginning
When I was pregnant
with Zane I was
actually asked by one of my mom's friends if I was planning on cloth
diapering. I was sure I would "never" do that. When
Zane
was about 6 months, I was starting to get pressure to wean (from my dr.
at the time no less) and was looking for advice on how to wean, even
though I really didn't want to. I found Mothering.com.
I found support for continuing to breastfeed my son, and in
the
process started watching the other forums. I noticed that the
busiest board was "Diapering" and wondered what there was to talk about
so much. When I discovered it was 'cloth', I thought the
women
were nuts.
Time passes, I get used to the idea, we move to a place with a washer
& dryer, and we are in a real pinch financially, so I finally
ordered my first dozen toddler prefolds, a snappi, and 3 covers.
The first attempts were beyond humorous. Even a
really big
14 month old still drowns in toddler size prefolds. lol.
Plus, I only had a dozen and was CDing full time. I
did
laundry every day, usually twice, sometimes three times a day.
It
was insane. After 2 weeks of that insanity I ordered 2 dozen
premium size prefolds. In another week or two I got 2 Happy Heinys and ordered a dozen
doublers/inserts from SMJAE.
I also heard about using fleece liners to keep their tushies
drier and got a yard of polar fleece from Wal-mart and cut it up. Not
long after, I got a mini-shower (which is probably the best investment
I have made. I honestly don't think I would have continued diapering
without it) That was my stash for a good while. I got a
diaper
now and then, but not a lot.
Within the last year or so, I had "the great diaper disaster".
Evidently my water chemistry and Oxyclean do NOT
agree. (A very unusual problem, btw) It put holes
in almost
all of my stash, which tore my diapers to rags in the following weeks.
I tried to save as many as I could with fray stop, but some
were
beyond repair. A few really kind mamas sent me some diapers
as I
rebuilt my stash, and I was able to get some prefolds at a really great
price. This time I went ahead and got Youth size (XXL) FuzziBunz, even
though they are a bit on the big side, because Zane was near the top of
the XL and FuzziBunz was discontinuing the line. (so they
might
not be available later and there aren't many diapers made that large).
The Next Saga Begins
I am expecting #2 in
January.
This time around, I have a friend who likes to sew that
decided
she would try to make me 'a few diaper covers'. (the same one who cloth
diapered hers and thought I was nuts to do it) Well, she has
been officially sucked in. I sent her some links on sewing
diapers and recommended the Very Baby pattern. She got really
excited about it, especially the idea of recycling materials and making
diapers from them. (She has the same "let's see how frugal we
can
do this" gene that I do) She did buy some materials, but most
of
the diapering material is from thrift shops and garage sales.
One of the really neat things about this is that her family went from
thinking she was crazy to her girls bringing their clothes to her
saying "this really doesn't fit me any more, can you make a diaper from
it?" (passing down that frugal gene there). It has
turned
into a family project for her. Very cool!
So, I thought others might be interested in seeing how cheaply she can
do this for and will be updating this page with the latest shipments
(and the price tag for the set) and see where we stand.
As of 08-29-05. this is what she has acquired:
- The Very
Baby pattern, aplix and elastic from diapershop
. She commented that she was shocked at how wonderful the
service was and how fast she got her order.
- Some
light green, light
blue, light pink, and ducky flannel from either Wal-mart or JoAnns.
She also found out that JoAnn's microfleece works as well as
Malden Mills (discovered this from online comments) at a much lower
price and I think she picked some of this up too. I think she
got
some PUL too.
- She got
an old rosebud flannel sheet from Angie (a mutual friend)
- Another
friend stopped by
with some material she found at a garage sale for really cheap, but she
wasn't sure what it was. It was wool jersey, really good
quality.
Some burgandy and gray pieces.
08-29-05:
made her first
"really, really ugly diaper" (her words, not mine).
She
said that the elastic on the legs wasn't very even, but she was really
excited and it looked cute and ugly at the same time. lol.
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