Other parents are interested in cloth diapering to save money and control their budget. Disposable diapers can cost an average family, diapering an average baby, thousands of dollars over the course of 2 years (that is assuming your child potty trains at two). When Jenn and Jimmy first started cloth diapering their oldest son, disposables weren’t even an option because they had to buy groceries, plain and simple.
Another reason families choose cloth is for health reasons. Some families are very concerned about making sure that only natural fibers touch their little one’s sensitive skin. This is an important thing to know about your cloth diapering interest as you begin to decide what you want to purchase for your baby. Many products are 100% polyester and most diaper covers contain some form of plastic.
How important is convenience to your family?
If you tend to throw a pizza in the oven or bring home takeout, then go with something simple. We recommend bumGenius Original Cloth Diapers with hook & loop closures for being one-size, as easy as disposables and our most popular product by far!
If you like to cook and create, then buy a little of this and a little of that. Don’t be afraid to try something. Dabbling can be half the fun of cloth diapering! If you go for Elemental Joy, bumGenius, Flip or Econobum, your purchase is based by a 30 day satisfaction guarantee. If you don’t like it, send it back to us and we’ll refund your purchase!
Finally, what is your budget?
We have a diapering system for just about any budget. If you have about $100 to spare, you can easily have enough simple cloth diapers and covers with our Econobum or Elemental Joy systems to last you through potty training. This is a simple, non-glamorous solution — but it gets the job done at a fantastic price!
If you just want to go with a diaper that is made with organic cotton, we’d encourage you to look towards bumGenius Elemental cloth diapers. The one-piece design of the bumGenius Elemental product is simple, one-size, natural fibers and absolutely stellar in terms of absorbency.
About the Author
Heather is mom to four, born within 40 months (single, twins, single). She writes transparently about her chaotic household to encourage others through the twists and turns of parenting.
Comments
7 Comments
I don’t use any of this brand, as I received an adequate supply of another brand as a gift from a friend when I mentioned wanting to switch to CD. I can’t count how many leaks (especially with the ebf first months poop!) I had with sposies! I thought it was just part of the deal. But with CD, the only times I’ve had leaks, it was only with pee and only when I got busy and went too long between changes. I use a hybrid and love the convenience of being able to use a disposable insert when doing something that requires it, but being able to use soft cloth all the time otherwise. I love that my DD has soft cloth against her bum instead of paper! I know I would hate wearing paper pants all the time! I also love love love not spending money every few weeks on something I throw away! My water and electric bills show hardly any change at all and I get to use cute colors and prints! And since I’m practicing extended BF and want my DD to know that I did everything I could to give her the best, I couldn’t very well say that I added to her earth’s problems. If I want her to respect our planet, I need to do whatever i can to model that behavior for her. My DH was skeptical at first that CDing would be too much extra work, but his concerns were short-lived. He is now a proud CD dad and both sets of grandparents have voiced how proud they are of us for all we do for her.
I like the AIO onesize. Its just a shame that the 4.0s don’t come in the brighter colors like moonbean, ribbit, zinnia, and clementine. I keep the Flips as back up for travel and the non-CD friendly.
With a stay-at-home daddy, thus only my income as a teacher, cost was a BIG factor for us. After checking the pricing on cloth vs. sposies, I was definitely interested. Then a friend explained the details (pocket vs prefold vs AIO) and how EASY it was to take care of them, and I was sold.
We went with the 3.0s for our regular use diapers – easier for daddy to use – and prefolds with Flip covers as our emergency stash. (Which have come in handy when diapers take longer to dry on wet days!)
Also, I’ve found that Flips are GREAT to put over sposies when you have to take a cross-country plane trip for a family emergency, and won’t be able to wash your cloth stash. They saved us from SO MANY leaks.
Honestly, knowing how much Sposies leak, I don’t see why people keep spending money on them. We’ve only had leaks on our cloth when we needed to stuff extra for longer naps.
I use Flip covers with Birdseye pre-folds. When my daughter was first born, I tried bummis whispers covers and Chinese pre-folds, but she was still too small and it made her butt bulky. She quickly grew out of them, and I didn’t like that every pee she had leaked right through the cover. I was going to get the cheaper version of Flip, but decided to risk the “investment” by other mothers’ comments. Happy to say I took that risk because I love the Flip. It is so easy and I know it will last for a long time. It holds a lot for a long time, is easy to wash and dry, and have no complaints. There are stains in it, but really, who needs perfectly clean-looking covers?
I decided to go with cloth diapers when I learned back in high school that diapers can take a million years to completely break down. Seeing as the environment is not what it once used to be, I am worried about my children and their children and what their future will be like on this dying planet 🙁 I am glad to be trying my best at being eco-friendly. There’s also the benefit of pocketing money, but that’s not a huge factor for me. The earth is number one!
I use Flip covers with pre-folds. My little one’s legs are long and skinny, so the pre-folds work well since I can cinch them up as tights as I need too. The flip covers are very quick to put on and fit her well. I also like the Flip covers because they have snaps instead of velcro. My baby is eight months old now and the covers have barely any signs of wear. The pre-folds hold up well too. I’ve heard many friends comments that pre-folds are confusing or too much trouble, but I really don’t think so. They take a little practice, but I quickly learned to put them on just as quickly as any other diaper system. After a couple of months, it is completely second nature.
As far as why I chose to cloth diaper: It boils down to finances. While my family can afford disposable diapers, I think it is ridiculous that disposable diapers cost so much, especially when you consider how they are used. Cloth diapering is my way of rebelling.
I’ll share my experience of cloth diapering for the past 19 months:
After trying 10+ different brands and types of diapers, I find myself always reaching for the elementals. Pocket dipes do not work for my dd. It doesn’t matter which brand, size, new or old, they leak EVERY TIME. Ever since she was tiny she has peed in huge floods and anything with a stay dry layer just can’t soak it up fast enough. So we went to fitteds and longies. After discovering she has a major sensitivity to hemp, goodmamas became the favourite and the few elementals we had were great for when she wore normal pants. Then, I went back to school this fall and I didn’t want to send my precious longies to daycare. So I bought 8 more elementals. For now, my “in use” stash is 6 goodmamas and 10 elementals. For night time an elemental with a good doubler works perfectly. I think I need a few more elementals and we’re all set until I have to start buying cute undies 🙂
Money is an issue (single, university student mama) but elementals are the only thing I have found that work well for my baby and I.
We use a little bit of everything. Our primary combo is a prefold and a cover. We have a pretty good variety of PUL covers, plus a few wool soakers. We use bumGenius 4.0s for overnights, Flip stay-dry inserts when she gets a rash or we’re feeling lazy, and Flip disposable inserts for road trips. We have flats for emergency backup and Elementals for groggy early mornings and for when family babysits. We even have some fuzzibunz pockets that a friend gave us, but I had to make suedecloth liners to put on top of the fleece, since our daughter gets a bad rash when she wets fleece.
If I would have known from the beginning what I like and what works well, I would have just gotten the NB Proraps covers, NB prefolds, one-size prefolds, 4 bg 4.0s, and about 10 Econonum and Flip covers.