My oldest child is about to turn 4, and his birthday always makes me reflect on all I’ve learned in these few short years of motherhood. One of my favorite parenting decisions we made was the choice to use cloth diapers. We have saved thousands of dollars using cloth diapers for our kids, and have kept tons of waste out of landfills. Besides the obvious economic and environment benefits, cloth diapers are super cute and great for my babies’ sensitive skin. Today I’m sharing my best cloth diapering advice after 4 hard fought years in the trenches so you can learn from my mistakes.
My Best Cloth Diaper Advice:
You CAN Do It. When I first mentioned trying cloth diapers while pregnant with my son, I had a lot of negative feedback. They economic and environmental benefits where too great for me to give up on the idea just because other people didn’t agree. My husband and I made the decision to go for it, and it has been working for us for nearly four years now. The hardest part? Getting started. I was so afraid it would be hard. Just prewash those diapers according the brand’s directions and go for it. You’ll make mistakes, but you’ll get the hang of it quickly.
Keep It Simple. Find the brand/kind you like and stick with it. My favorite are the Softbums Omni and BumGenius Free Time. You can read about the 11 brands we tried and tested here. Find a diaper laundry routine that works for you and don’t over complicate it. Read about our easy cloth diaper laundry routine here. Do what works for you. Don’t get bogged down in cloth diaper FB group or chat room drama. Yes, that is a thing. Don’t go over budget buying cloth diapers. You can diaper a child from birth to potty training for as little as $100. For real.
If I Had It All To Do Over Again… I would change 2 things. I would buy bumGenius Newborn diapers and cloth diaper from the time we got home from the hospital. I had a few and loved them, and was able to sell them after we were done using them. I would also buy all bumGenius Freetimes with snaps once out of the newborn stage. Although I initially preferred the aplix, the velcro doesn’t work as well after 4 years of wear and tear. I love my Softbums, but they haven’t held up as well either. The BumGenius 4.0s are fabulous as well, but the Freetimes are by far the easiest and most functional out of all the diapers we tried.
You can read more of my cloth diapering tips here, and my favorite all time cloth diaper hack here. If you are a cloth diaper user, what is your best advice for a new parent?
Be sure to check out the Every Parent’s Guide to Natural Parenting and Earth Month Blog Hop at ALLterNATIVElearning for the best green living tips and information to help you celebrate Earth Month.
We have a few bum genius diapers and I found they were handy to have especially for when out and about, but my favorite is just plain and simple trusty prefolds and covers. I didn’t find them anymore work than the bum genius, and a lot easier to wash being cotton. I just pulled out all the diapers for baby number two coming in a few weeks! They are so tiny and cute! 🙂