Showing posts with label bumGenius. Show all posts
Showing posts with label bumGenius. Show all posts

Saturday, July 6, 2013

Cloth Diapers. How hippie are we?

We love air conditioning and showers. We eat fast food. I work in a cubicle for 'the Man'. We're not the type of parents that cloth diaper..... or are we?

About a year ago, I saw a friend post these things called FuzziBunz for sale. That sounds cool. What are FuzziBunz? Are they like a Snuggie? Because I love me a Snuggie. No. They are cloth diapers, but not like the cloth diapers that our parents used. They are super cute and have a waterproof exterior, so no leaking on mom and dad.

Hmmm.

Could we use those? How do we wash them? Would our washer have poo and pee in it after? How much do they cost? Whoa. There are like 1,000 different kinds of cloth diapers now. Which ones are best?!

After our little girl was born, and we realized that we spent roughly $2.50 a day on disposable diapers, which were also bad for the environment and possibly bad for our baby, we decided to give this cloth diaper thing a try.

Where did we start?

We did a trial through Kelly's Closet. We got 5 different types of brand new diapers and we had 30 days to try them. Anything we didn't want, we returned for 100% store credit or 90% Paypal refund (minus shipping). I figured, this was a relatively inexpensive and risk-free way to learn about these new kinds of cloth diapers. Let's give it the old college try.

First of all, let's get one thing straight: I hate laundry. HATE it. I always have. I will leave clean laundry in a heaping pile on any unused bed for days before folding it. But, the crazy thing is, I LOVED doing the diaper laundry. Why? I have no idea. I still can't explain it. I think it's because I felt like I was doing the right thing by my baby, my wallet and the environment. It's like some weird high you get from doing good in the world.

Secondly, our washer and dryer are awful. We got the washer for free from a friend who had it in storage for the better part of 10 years. I'm pretty sure it's a 1980s model, but it's always worked fine, so we haven't replaced it. I didn't think it would hold up to poopy diapers.... It did! The diapers come out looking brand new with no residue on the diapers or in the washer.

After two days of cloth, I was hooked. Not only for all the aforementioned reasons, but also because our little girl no longer had red, irritated skin in her diaper area. Cloth breathes way better than disposables.

In the end, we decided on the bumGenius 4.0 pocket diapers. They fit our baby the best, wash and dry easily, and are not as bulky as their All in One counterparts. Our whole arsenal of cloth diapers costs less than $250, which at our rate of using disposables will pay off in 3 months.

So, I guess we are a bunch of crunchy hippies. Bring on the granola and patchouli!

For some videos of our cloth experience, answers to some of my FAQs and reviews of the diapers we tried look here:
Cloth Diaper Videos