Day Two: The Snappi

Since I already disqualified myself yesterday, I decided to not do this challenge fully.

This choice comes because I have to go to the doctor's office four days out of the five this week, and our doctor is on the other side of the city.

I also don't own any flats, I was planning on using receiving blankets until my flats came in tomorrow.

So we will call this my abridged version =]

I couldn't get the origami fold to work with a receiving blanket, so I used the kite fold, which worked great.

I still can't quite get the snappi to work. I could get the left and right side to work, but the bottom didn't work so great.

I was also a little worried about the diarrhea that Audrey gets for a few hours after she gets her antibiotic shot, but I actually liked the flat better than her regular fitted for the containment of diarrhea.

How did your day 2 go?

Day One: Fail

How did all of your first days go?

Let me tell you about my day.

On April 28th I took Audrey into her doctor, she'd be pulling at her ear, screaming and running a fever for the past several days.

She was had a double ear infection.

So we got our antibiotics and went on our way, and she took them for 10 days.

At the end of 10 days I didn't see much improvement, so I took her back to the doctor.

The doctor told us that one of her ears was better, and the other was still infected.

Second round of antibiotics, and the ear was NOT better. In fact she hasn't been sleeping much, she's too busy screaming at us.

So I took her back in today. Not only is that ear MUCH worse, but the other ear (which had previously healed) was reinfected and not doing well either.

I was told that there was a pretty good chance that her ear drums will rupture in the next few days, and that when it happens, to bring her back so they can assess damage.

We were also given a referral to the ENT doctor, and Audrey started her first round (out of the 3) of antibiotic shots.

I was told this shot will cause diarrhea.

This week I get to go see the doctor 4 days.

So, yeah, I didn't exactly get around to doing the flats challenge. This kind of disqualifies me, but I still plan on doing this challenge, I'll just start later than everyone else.

Do you have a story? I'd love to have you as a guest blogger!

(Oh, and I can't figure out the snappi, any tips?)

Flats & Hand washing Challenge: The Why

Why do the flats and hand washing challenge?

Well, it's simple, in my church we are encouraged to have supplies in case of an emergency. We are encouraged to have 72 hour kits, 1 year of food storage, etc.

With Sydney I always had an extra box of diapers, that I kept in storage. When I bought a new box, I would replace the one that was in storage.

For the past few months I have wondered how to have a storage of cloth diapers. I knew I could hand wash if necessary, and we just added extra water to our food storage.

So I figure this challenge is the perfect excuse to try out using flats, which is something I have never tried to use, and have no knowledge of.

My daughter's skin is very sensitive. If we put her in ANY disposables, she breaks out, horribly. In the event of an emergency, in which water or power would be cut off, flats would be a better choice than our pockets or fitted diapers.

Do you want to learn more about the flats challenge? Maybe do it yourself?
It starts tomorrow. I will be using ONLY flats for 1 week, and hand washing them myself. WITHOUT the use of my diaper sprayer (shocker!)
The exact details are here.
Will you be joining me? :)

Flats & Hand washing Challenge

This challenge starts Monday. Look for my daily posts about using and hand washing
flats! :)

Information is here.

Rumparooz One Size Cover

There were 2 major things I look for in a diaper cover.

1. One Size
2. Snaps

And I kind of wanted the gussets. I thought those were pretty awesome.

And I saw two diaper covers that fit that bill, Blueberry and Rumparooz. Rumparooz were less expensive, so I decided to try them first.

Oh, I love them! It was kind of strange for me at first, there are 4 sizes instead of the usual 3. The diaper also seems pretty tight, which is something that I like, but my wiggly baby did not! (She's got things to bite, don't you know?)

I love all the pretty colors.

Rumparooz are not made with PUL, instead they are made with TPU, which is suppose to be better environmentally (from my understanding.) The TPU is much thicker, which is another feature that I really like.

This is going on my list of current favorites!

Where to buy: I bought mine from Squishy Tushy, simply because they have lots of the pretty colors in stock, and the shipping was free at $50. This was my second order from them, and I plan to make future ones. They have great customer service, and are very quick to ship. Both of my orders went out the same day and were at my house within 2-3 days! :)

Next on my list is to buy some Blueberry Coveralls! I can't wait to try them!

CJ's BUTTer Giveaway WINNER!

Happy Mother's Day to you all! :)

The winner of CJ's BUTTer giveaway is:

#8 is Marsee Family who said: "Love Cj's and hope to win some free stuff"

Congratulations, I will be emailing you shortly!

Thank you to all of you who entered :)

Mama Cloth

I guess this doesn't necessarily apply to everyone.

It depends on why you cloth diaper.

I cloth diaper because of my daughter's sensitive skin. And after doing a bit of research I decided that I would try to avoid as many harmful chemicals as I could.

Autumn over at All About Cloth Diapers has a semi-funny story about disposable pads vs. a flash flood.

Which reminded me of when I was about 5-years-old. I had stolen my baby brother's diaper and put it on one of my dolls. Somehow the diaper got left outside, and as it does so often in Washington, it rained. When I woke up the next morning and went out side to play, I discovered that the diaper had exploded! And there were all these gelly chrystals everywhere. My friend and I proceeded to play with them. And that afternoon we began to steal more of our younger siblings diapers and left them outside so they would explode. I believe this went on for two days before our parents caught on and put a stop to it. Though, I don't believe either of our parents realized we were playing in harmful chemicals, they simply didn't want us wasting their diapers. (ha!)

But, I figured, cloth diapers are softer than disposables, right?
So cloth pads would be softer than disposables as well!

So I bought some from 4 companies, and I attempted to make my own.

All with wings, because I can't stand normal pads without wings. Here was something that was interesting to me though, I normally buy overnight pads and wear them during the day. With cloth pads I was able to buy regular pads and be just fine! They were more absorbent and SOOOOO much more comfortable.

I bought 13 pads, figuring that it would last me through 2 days. I also purchased 2 wet bags, one for home and one for on the go. I was also instructed to use stain remover on them once they are used, so my on-the-go wet bag has a mini spray bottle of Shout in it.

It was just as simple as cloth diapers. I personally didn't wash them twice (unless they were thrown in with the diapers) I just threw them in with my everyday clothes.

Here are the four different types I bought:
Pink Lemonade
GEM
MotherMoonPads
Tamarack Creations

Pink Lemonade: This was the last site I bought from, and the first to arrive! Super fast shipping, and shipping is FREE!! I loved how soft these were, they were a little expensive. About $10 per pad, but they are so soft, and of great quality, and they are extremely pretty! Plus free shipping, which you all know I'm a sucker for! These were my preferred and the first I would grab. I plan on buying 2 more. **I guess shipping isn't always free, it was part of an Earth Day promotion.**

MotherMoonPads: I was slightly disappointed by this site. Shipping was $2.75, I spent $18 on two overnight pads, and $7.75 per pad on regular pads (I bought 2.) The quality is a good, the shipping was also fast, but they pads themselves were kind of blah. But they were super soft and stains came out super easy. I just really liked bright colors.

Tamarack Creations: $7.00 per pad, and $2 for shipping for the first item and $0.75 for each additional item. I really liked these pads, they were so bright and pretty, and had some PUL on the inside. They were great, and my second choice pads. They were nice and soft. :)

GEM: I bought these first, as they were not expensive (I believe I paid $15 for 4 pads) and shipping was included. However, they took about 10 days to get to me, and I only got to use one of them, which it was soft and nice, and they are well made. If you're on a budget, or want to use Mama Cloth inexpensively than I would start with them!

What I Liked About Cloth Pads: They were SUPER soft, they didn't chafe. They weren't hot or uncomfortable.

What I Didn't: I was never sure if I should throw them in with my diapers (as you use stain remover on them) or with my clothes (fabric softener.)

One thing that I learned though, was that using my diaper sprayer didn't work so great with the cloth pads. Instead I use ran it under the sink in my bathroom, worked much better. But I suppose you could always stick the entire pad in the toilet and then spray.

$16,144.83 vs. $1,385.05

When I first looked into cloth diapering I was blown away by the price, seriously $19.99 for a SINGLE diaper? I was a major coupon-er, I looked for deals, I would hold out until I found an item for a certain price. If I was handed $20 and told to go buy diapers with it, cloth diapers would not have been how I would spend my money, I would have gone straight to Rite Aid with a fistful of coupons and bought about 6 small packages for $20.

So, yes, the cost can knock the wind out of you. But there are several ways to make it more cost effective, as well as different ways to cloth diaper.

A Diaper Service

I’ll start with the different methods of cloth diapering. The first way is one that I would not recommend, it won't save you money, and I've personally tried it and really disliked it; was a diaper service. My local diaper service cost me about $70 a month (for 50 diapers a week, I used the service when my daughter was 21 months old.) Once a week a man in a truck would come, take my yucky diapers and replace them with clean ones. I had to provide the covers, and wash those myself, the cheapest I have found are called Econobums, they are a PUL (waterproof material) one-sized cover so you have to snap them down to make them a size small or medium, so it’s nice not to have to keep buying the different sizes of covers, and these covers are $8.95. It was nice because I didn't have to wash the diapers. It was terrible because the diapers were only washed once a week. I had a pail of gross diapers sitting in my tiny apartment for 7 days, odor-eaters didn't work. I also didn't have the flexibility to choose what type of diapers I wanted; I had to use prefolds, the old-school cloth diapers.

Service Per Month: $70 (840 per year)

7 Econobum Covers: $62.65 (You need one cover per day)

I’ve heard many women say that they don’t cloth diaper simply because the diaper service is not eco-friendly, which it’s not. But I was shocked to find out that they thought that that was the only way of cloth diapering! Washing the diapers yourself cuts down costs exponentially.

Prefolds

If you want to do the work yourself, buying prefolds and covers, this is a truly inexpensive way to go! On Amazon you can buy a package of 12 for $10.99! Buy two packs and you'd have more than enough diapers to wash them once every other day You'd also need a cover to go over the diaper, and you don't need as many covers as you do diapers, because unless they get poo on them, you just replace the prefold, so I'd recommend buying 4 if you plan on washing every other day.

24 Gerber Prefolds $21.98
4 Econobum Cover: $35.80
Prefold Total: $57.78

Fitted Diapers

Fitted diapers are like the prefolds, except that they are in the shape of a diaper. They usually

Velcro or snap together, and also require a cover. I know some people who let their kids walk around in just the fitted diaper. They are more reliable than fitted or flats (they don't move around and get poo on the cover.) These are great, because the diaper allows the bum to breathe a lot more than some of the options listed below. Fitted diapers start at $8, these also are mostly sized, same as the cover.
The least expensive route that I have found are Mother-Ease One Size, which cost $11.95 each. These are great fitted diapers, and the fact that they are one-sized helps cut costs, as you don’t have to keep re-buying your stash.

18 diapers Mother-Ease One Size: $215.10
4 Econobum: $35.80
Fitted Total: $250.90

Pocket Diapers
Pocket diapers are diapers that you have to put flats in between the PUL cover and another fabric. This requires you to stuff all the diapers prior to use. While they are very nice to have, because you don't have to wrestle a wiggly baby for nearly as long, they do get very pricey. These can also be sized, or one sized. The least expensive that I have found is called Kawaii diapers. These run about $6.99 per diaper (if you can get them from the main website, which can prove challenging at times) or $7.75 if you buy them elsewhere (I've only found this price at Jack Be Natural.)

18 Kawaii's: $125.82 (or $130.50)

I must say it though, Kawaii's are the least expensive by a long shot. You might have some that are even cheaper, but Kawaii's are good quality diapers for very inexpensive (I tried one that was $5.50 for a diaper and it was horrible quality.) The next closest price is $15 per diaper.

18 diapers for $15 each- $270

All-in-Ones

These diapers are super easy to use! There is no stuffing, no covers, it's a diaper that has everything you need in one diaper. It's like a pocket diaper, except that instead of having a pocket, it's sewn right across. These are the most expensive way of cloth diapering. They typically cost about $25 each. But they are what I call “daddy-friendly,” they are easy for people who don’t cloth diaper to use, as they (like the pocket diapers) are single use diapers, many day-cares require AIO diapers if you plan on cloth diapering while your child is in daycare.
18 AIO diapers: $450


Now that I've laid out the different types of diapers, and how much they cost for a 2 day supply, let’s compare them to disposables. Let’s say that you still use 18 diapers in 2 days, and that you get a box of 80 diapers for $26.99 (Size 3 Huggies, obviously this number is slightly skewed as when your baby is younger you will go through more diapers and the box has more diapers, and when they get older the box has less diapers.)


If you use diapers for 3 years:

Diaper Service: $2,582.65

Prefolds: $57.78

Fitted: $250.90

Pocket: $125.82 / $270

AIO: $450

Disposables: $3,324.83 (9 diapers per day * 365 days * 3 years / 80 diapers per box * $26.99 per box)

This is solely the price of diapers that you will pay. Let’s look at the other things you will need when diapering a baby for three years.

Things you need for disposables:

Diaper genie $40.39

Diaper genie refills $7.49 per month ($269.64 for 3 years)

Wipes $11.99 per month ($431.64 for 3 years)

Things you need for cloth diapering:

Spray bottle for wipe solution: $0.99

Baby wash (for homemade wipe solution): $4.79 for 15oz (this lasts me 3 months, so $57.48 for 3 years)

Baby oil (for homemade wipe solution): $5.99 for 20oz (this lasts me 4 months, so $53.91 for 3 years)

Large Wet Bag: $29.95

Travel Wet Bag: $21.00

Diaper Soap: $14.95 for 80 loads (15 loads per month, this will last 5 months, so $107.64 for 3 years)

Cloth Wipes: I made mine, I bought 1 yard of fleece from JoAnn Fabric for $6.99 (I used a coupon) and it made 50 wipes for me.

Total for Disposables for 3 Years: $4,066.50
Most Expensive Cloth Diaper System For 3 Years: $727.96
Least Expensive Cloth Diaper System For 3 Years: $335.74

Did I mention the best part? You can use cloth diapers for more than one child! I know some people who have used the same diapers for 4 children! Let’s do the math!

4 children in disposables for 3 years each: $16,144.83 (diaper genie was only added once.)
4 children in cloth diapers for 3 years each, expensive system: $1,385.05 (baby wash, baby oil, and diaper soap added for each child, all the other things only added once.)
4 children in cloth diapers for 3 years each, cheap system: $992.83

$16,144.83 vs. $1,385.05?!

(Let me tell you, even I was shocked when I got this number!)

What about the cost of washing the diapers? This is a question that depends on where you live. I live in the Pacific NW, and it only costs me about $2 more per month to wash cloth diapers every other day. But I do know others in different states whose bill doubled or tripled, it all just depends on where you live.

There are several ways to cut some of these costs down as well. For disposables you can follow couponing blogs, clip coupons and get the diapers for a fraction of the cost. The same goes with cloth diapers, stores are always having sales, discounts, and there are several work-from-home moms who sell these items for very inexpensive (Nana's Bottoms is a great route to go!) Or if you're handy with a sewing machine you can just make them for yourself, Very Baby has several PDF patterns for sale that are very easy to follow.

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All calculations were done by me, all disposable diaper information was taken from diapers.com, the cloth diaper information was the least expensive that I was able to find online.