My mother refused to get disposable diapers for my dolls, and instead showed me how to fold cloth diapers.  I was an outcast even before I grew up. 

Years later, I remember ranting to my mom about how unfair it was that the paper-product industry had women over a barrel because we had to buy pads or tampons for our periods. 

A few years after that, my mom and I were in Olympia, WA checking out a college when we stumbled on Glad Rags, washable menstrual pads.  Amazed, and slightly grossed out (recalling Mom's stories of how her friend had to use rags while staying with Italian nuns in a remote area of Sudan (or Kenya, can't recall which)), we decided to buy the Glad Rag and see how it worked.  I have to say that I had mixed results, but I bled through disposable pads anyway, so it didn't really make much of a difference at first.  I suspect using cloth may have helped to lighten my flow, but I am not sure.  And, breastfeeding for nearly three years now, I've only had two or three periods in the past four years now anyway.

So, point being, that I found out pretty easily that not only were there many, many cloth diaper users around "these days," but also that cloth had evoloved into many, many, many varations to make it "easier" to diaper with cloth.  Better for baby, better for momma earth, sounds good.  So, while pregnant, I ebay'd a collection of various diapers.  Many were "just like disposable" types (either All-In-Ones or Pocket Diapers), made for ease of use.  These run about $15-25 a piece.  When a typical stash of diapers is about 24-36, that is a lot of moolah. 

With our third anniversary of cloth diapering quickly approaching (January!), I have found myself LMAO the past couple of weeks after a friend suggested I take flats (flat fold, read: a piece of cloth surged or hemmed) and PUL diaper covers on our upcoming trip, to save $$ on dryer usage.  So, she and I whipped up a bunch of new covers and quickly discovered that receiving blankets make excellent flats.  My diapered baby will be six months next week and she will be sporting whole new stash which probably is worth a grand total of ... $150 and that is being a bit generous.  Granted, if I did not have a sewing genius with a snap press for a friend, I would not be so lucky with the covers, but even so, I could have gone to the local diaper swap and picked some up last weekend on the cheap.

Now, I knew about prefolds and snappi's with Gerber vinyl pants as a cheap option, but they can make a baby awefully clamy and it is kind of gross because the whole diaper gets soaked.  Having said that, the blanket-diaper system we've developed in our home-based R&D "lab" is not all that different, but, by virtue of the snaps, if there is a messy poop, it won't get all over legs on the way down and it is possible to remove a diaper touching only the PUL (oh, sorry, that's a laminated plastic bonded to either broad cloth or polyester).  I just think it is so funny, because most families end up with more blankies then they know what to do with -- especially if you have a spring or summer baby like we did this time 'round.  Oh, and I just gave a bunch I borrowed (because we homebirthed and needed a bunch on hand for the birth) back.  I had gotten some from Freecycle too.

SO, my tip of the day for expecting parents who want to cloth diaper is save those blankets.  You can't swaddle with them, so they're pretty pointless otherwise anyway. ;)

Submitted by UnderCoverMother (view blog)