Did/do any of you cloth diaper your twins?

[JoyNChrist]

We never used cloth with DS, but I was pretty determined to at least give cloth a fair try with this pregnancy, and did a lot of research on different systems. Then we found out it's twins, and I'm not really sure what to do.

On the one hand I know that cloth would save me a lot of money (which, I'll be honest, is more of my motivation than the ecological factors). I also think it's just better for babies - more natural, less chances of rashes, etc. But then I also know that my time is going to be at a premium taking care of two newborns and a 3-year-old, and maybe I don't want to add another chore to my list.

I'm thinking I may wait until the twins are a month or two old (when we get past the meconium stage and I get into my parenting groove), then slowly start adding cloth and see how it goes. I was thinking of trying the Flip system, since it seems easy and affordable, and there's a disposable option for when we're out with the babes.

Your thoughts? What worked for you? Is cloth just too much hassle with multiples?

[rachel65655]

I am CDing my toddler and twins right now and it is not so bad. I am using pockets and like those. I rinse all dipes out once a day and wash every other day.

[daisie31]

I'm using cloth with mine. I didn't cloth my first child but decided to this time to save money and not use all the unknown chemicals. I didn't start until they were about nine lbs because they didn't fit in the one size pockets I got (bum genius) and I hated the prefolds. Personally, I think you are very smart to wait until about two months because you will not need one more thing to do in the begining. I love using cloth! They have a bit of a learning curve IMO with the washing, getting a system down, but they are fun to me for some odd reason. My dh says stuffing them is theraputic for him, lol. I do have some fitteds that a friend loaned me and I used them on and off int he early days but they take forever to dry and you have to essentially diaper twice, first the dipe then the cover so I won't be purchasing any of those. The bum genius are great and look cute on.

Dena

[kalynnsmom]

I didn't use cloth with newborns, but I did use them when my boys were 6 months old. I had the same concerns and in fact, said I wouldn't use cloth. I ended up changing my mind because of the crazy amount of disposables we were going through.

I also have an older daughter; she was 4 when they were born.

It isn't too bad once you get into a routine with them. I mostly used PF's and pockets (preferred OS because I liked the way they could fit around my boys' body types)

[newmommy7-08]

I CD my 20 month old and will CD my twins. I strongly encourage you to at least buy your prefolds, prep them and have them ready to go... merconium shouldn't last more than a week if I remember correctly. If you don't have them prepped and ready I can see it being put off forever. I followed your plan w/ our singleton and it took me forever to decide to use the cloth. This time I'm cutting up a bunch of fleece strips to put in the dipes for liners and not really worrying if they get a little stained. I think it's much easier to start as you mean to go...otherwise the other way will be your easy way and you're not going to want to add in the extra step of washing. If you start w/ cloth from day 1... it'll be your routine. Good Luck!

[sbgrace]

I cloth diapered my boys but they were older (I don't remember..six months perhaps) before a friend (with twins herself) got me started.
It's doable. I was completely and totally in survival mode when they were newborns to about two or three months and I don't think I could have handled another thing at that time though I know people do cloth diaper from the start w/multiples.

[Red Pajama]

I cloth diapered my twins (and the singleton that followed). We had a collection of prefolds that we used when the babies were small, and then switched to MotherEase diapers after they were 8 lbs. MotherEase uses snaps so it's a one size diaper. They have a couple different covers that are sized. I had 6 covers in each size, as well as a ton of diapers. People were willing to give them to us for our baby shower. I think I had over 60 ME diapers.

It wasn't that much more work, although they do not fit into clothes as long due to the diaper. We did diapers about every other day. We used a toilet sprayer to rinse the diapers, and a 5 gallon bucket to put the diapers in.

We used disposibles for long distance travel. Day trips, unless I needed a tiny diaper bag, were cloth diapers usually. I started using disposibles for night diapers sometime after 6 months, so I could quit changing in the night.

What I have loved about cloth diapers is not running out. There's never an emergency trip to the store because we're out. And even if you chose to use disposibles for nights or outings, you're still cutting your use and expense of diapers.

[someonenamedleah]

I'm CD'ing our boys. We have been since pretty shortly after they were out of the hospital (about 4 weeks old). They are currently two months old and about 7-8 lbs. What I'm liking best right now are prefolds with bummis covers and bumgenius AIO size xs. But then, my guys are pretty little yet.

I too think CD'ing is kind of fun. I've also bought a bunch of different sizes, styles etc. to try as we go... there are a lot of sites where people buy/sell/trade used diapers, so it's pretty inexpensive. There are also some nice WAHM diapers on etsy and hyena cart. I would suggest not investing in a ton of one kind of diaper until you know what you like and what works best for you and your babies.

I don't find that CD'ing adds too much extra work to my day. However, I am formula feeding, so I probably have more free time, since I don't have to pump like a lot of mamas here and DH can help with feeding when he's home.

[Gena 22]

We started at 5 months, since I didn't want to take too much on at first. Love our CDs! By far the hardest part was figuring out what kinds to use and getting set up. It took me a few weeks to get all up and running. But I haven't bought a diaper in well over a year.

If I had it to do all over again I'd use a diaper service at first, when the twins are little and growing fast. Then, when they're closer to fitting into medium diapers I'd commit. Also, I think changing a infant into a prefold would have been easy. Squirming toddlers, not as easy.

We've tried everything except pockets and g-diapers. As much as I love PFs, my best combo is Crickett's Fitted Hemp under Mothersease AirFlow. No leaks, ease to launder and change, reasonable prices.

Good luck!

[Nanasi]

We cloth diaper our twins. They're our only children, so that definitely makes a difference in the amount of time we have to spend on laundry. Ours are in fitted cotton diapers (that my mom and I made) with a PUL cover. It works great for us! We use disposables when we're out and that's when we have blowouts. The cloth diapers work so much better than the disposables.

Laundering them isn't bad. We spray them with Bac-Out and toss them in a garbage can with a lid. We pretty much wash them daily, but it's not a big hassle once it's part of your routine. My husband has taken charge of mixing and rolling the cloth wipes for the warmer and he's often the one to start the diapers. It's easy for him to do when I'm nursing the boys. It takes about 2.5 hours for us to do a load: cold soak, hot wash, (there should be another rinse, but it rarely happens), 70 minutes in the dryer.

We have had some problems with yeast rashes, but I think that's because I had three rounds of antibiotics during and after the c-section. We've been treating it by sunning their buns, slathering them with coconut oil and hanging the diapers on a line to dry. I think their rashes would be worse, if they were in disposables.

[obxbound]

I'm on day 2 and so far so good. Thank you for starting this thread and thank you for all the response.

[fyrebloom]

I've CD'ed all four of mine, although I must say I was lazier about it with the twins. I didn't take them out in CD usually and I don't use them at night. We had some rash issues and then stopped with the night cloth (they were toddlers though when we did). Now they're not in cloth but they are day trained on the potty and only need them at night (when they get rashes from the diapers). So yeah it's totally doable, but the same restrictions apply with two as do with one. Gotta find the diapers, cleaning regimin etc that works best for all of you. Nice thing about twins is it's double the diapers but not double the laundry, you do however have to buy double (which can work out nice as hand me downs to the next child. My son has a HECK of a stash now )

[Hilarigh]

we're planning on cding these guys but not straight away. we will be first time parents x 2 and i want to get the hang of being parents before we start in with the cd. i know myself and expect these twins to kick our a$$es so adding cds on top of already being overwhelmed would just be setting ourselves up for failure.

i like the mother-ease sandy's fitted diapers. i'm still trying to decide how many we'll need.

[Intertwined]

I promise it's no harder than sposies, just more washing. Slapping the dipes on the booty is the same though! We're in sposies right now because our washing for eight got out of hand while DH and I were separated. Now that our house is running smoothly again we'd like to put them back in cloth. Not only is it terribly expensive to put sposies on twin booties but mine are wanting to potty learn and I know from experience that it will help them figure out when they are wet better.

[MawrtyrB]

If I didn't already have a huge gdiaper stash from DD I would totally try Flip. We have 3 in CD. There isn't a diaperbag big enough to carry that much of our regular cloth so we're using gdiapers to go out during the day now, with cloth inserts (gflappers), except for travel or going to the beach.

As to regular CD, we had a good sized stash from DD when we had the twins so we could resuse alot. DH raves about how much diaper money we save. It's doable, I just have to wash everyday. I have enough diapers to go longer but the load gets too big otherwise.

[dividedsky]

i use cloth at home (day+night), and sposies when out + about. my main reason being i think it's icky to have paper+plastic strapped to one's butt for ~3yrs.

it's no big deal. i just toss a load in at night before bed. we use all-in-ones w/a cotton interior for ease of use and laundering.

[DanteLoganMom]

We are CDing our 18 mo twins and we LOVE IT. We have sprayer and about 50 CD - do laundry about every 2-3 days (2 loads). We started at week 4 with BumGenius. They are so easy to use and leak so much less. Plus the disposables we started with would always end up with gel crystals all over their genitals.

We also traveled quite a bit with them (they have about 26K air miles each) and take the CDs with us. We tried with disposables and it was a traveling disaster because they are skinny babies and disposables are for fat legged kids.

[bekahlily]

I CD'd mine... we had to, because of the cost. My DS was only 19mos when my DDs were born, so we ended up having three in diapers for about a year. For us, we had the option of buying disposable dipes or groceries... eating won that one. We still did disposable at night and about half the time we went out, mainly because my DH would have virtually nothing to do w/ the CD (he thought they were "gross" ) We used fitted CDs that I made myself. I made them in separate pieces (body, one or two lay-in inserts for absorbency) so that they would dry faster, and washed a load each night.

[livingfree]

i have a 3.5yo and 6 month twin boys...i CD my boys. full time until the past week or so. we started out with preemie pfs, but i think it would have just been better to use sposies when they were so tiny and i had so much help that didn't really know how to fold the pfs, etc.

we currently have 35 small fuzzi bunz, but the boys are outgrowing them. i had 10 left over from dd and bought 25 new that were discontinued colors, so they were $11.95 each. they are great and everyone knows how to use them! i still wash every 1.5 days though and i was getting tired, so i'm taking a little break and using some 7th generation sposies.

right now i'm trying to figure out what i want to do for the next size of diapers...