Cloth diapers?? « Back to Group Discussions

[tropicana74]

Hi! I am new here. DH and I have always considered ourselves minimalists (much to my MIL's disappointment...not only does she like stuff, she like expensive stuff)! :-)
I am happy to see that there is a group of moms here who get me...I too experience feelings of anxiety and stress when there is too much stuff in my living space.

Anyway, that brings me to my question. I am due next month...our fourth (and final) baby. I have been agonizing about cloth diapering this time around. I always used disposables with our others but it always really bothered me seeing what I was adding to the landfills every week. 

So, I finally realized today that part of my problem is the clutter issue with cloth diapers! I feel like with disposables I have one package of diapers and a package of wipes and it is neat and tidy and efficient. Whenever I research cloth all I see (besides some darn cute diapers) is more stuff....pre-folds+ covers + snappis + laundry wet bags + special detergent + homemade wipes etc. I get so flustered thinking of all the "stuff" AND I feel like I should have started on cloth a couple babies ago and that at this point it isn't really practical that I am going to have all this stuff around that was used for a very short amount of time.

So, all that to say, how many of you on here cloth diapered vs. disposable and how did that fit into your minimalist lifestyle?
 

[LilHelper]

Cloth diapers should be easy, not confusing or over-whelming.

Half of the stuff that you see advertised for use around cloth diapers are not necessary and can easily  be replaced with other stuff that you already own or use.

For example:

1) No special detergent is required to was cloth diapers. As long as your detergent does not have fabric softeners or bleach any detergent is fair game. Also, use as little detergent as you can get away with. When washing cloth, detergent is not your friend.

2) You can avoid buying excess stuff like snappis, pref-folds and diaper covers by simply buying one-size diapers that are water-proof. They might be a tad expensive, but it is worth it to prevent clutter, which is your main concern. We prefer all-in-twos as they are the simplest and give you the best bang for your buck.

3) No wet bag necessary. All you need is a water-proof bag that you can insert in a garbage pail. Just wash the pail liner along with your diapers and you are done.

4) You don't need homemade wipes, you could simply use the any old t-shirt to wipe your baby's bum.

Best of luck and let me know if you need any more info or clarifications.

[SomethingAnonymous]

You can get covers or all-in-ones that will last you pretty much the whole time they are in diapers- so it won't be just a short time. Flip covers are one example (8-35 lbs).

You don't need a special wet bag or pail, we just have a 2.5 gallon bucket on top of our dryer, I throw diapers in there.

When we go out we used to just use plastic grocery bags, but I have found that a wetbag is really pretty nice for the diaper bag.

I don't think special detergent is necessary at all. We use homemade detergent and it works perfectly fine for our diapers.
 

I feel like cloth diapering fits really well into our minimalistic lifestyle. (we just do prefolds and covers, mostly no snappis- its just one pile of covers in the closet, and one pile of prefolds, with a small stack of cloth wipes next to it)

[Rainey Daye]

We are close to having our second child (the last bio one, though we may adopt in the future) and I did not cloth diaper our first, but plan on cloth diapering this one. We had some ladies from my church throw me a baby shower and I got almost 100 disposable newborn diapers in my diaper cake!! Eesh!! 

Anyway, this is what we plan on doing. I got a dozen newborn Alva pocket diapers slightly used for only $30 from a lady on Craigslist and will have the use of about a dozen more cloth diapers of various sorts through a "sisterhood of the traveling newborn diapers" thing some online friends put together. That should definitely be more than enough to get us to the point where Sweetpea is old enough for one size diapers. I did a group buy with some friends of a dozen one size Alva pocket diapers and an extra six inserts for overnight wetting. I MIGHT also get a dozen prefolds and three covers to round things out...depending on how well I can keep on top of keeping the pocket diapers clean. 

But really, the way that I am hoping to truly keep things minimal is by doing Elimination Communication with my wee one. If we are successful with it even part time it will definitely cut down on the need for very much in the way of cloth diapers. 

[reneekangaroo]

I've been cloth diapering for four years and will be cloth diapering for several years to come. I prefer it for a ton of reasons, but since this is a minimalist group, I'll just say that I prefer the simplicity of it. 18-30 diapers can last your child his entire diapering years. You can get all-in-ones, so no inserts or covers to mix and match and stash away. Adding a wetbag is an additional thing, but you can use it for more than just diapers. We use ours for wet swim suits and anything messy that needs to be transported. I also use it for my cloth pads (which I also love the simplicity of). I've never used disposables aside from the occasional back-ups for a road trip, but I imagine that they're a financial drain, and when you run out you have to go to the store and get more. I really don't like things that run out aside from food and cleaning solutions. I don't like being so dependent on store availability. Plus they're such a waste - there's all the energy that goes into making them and their packaging, transporting them, then you flush your money down the drain each time you buy them, and then they're used once and tossed in a landfill. How many times do babies poop right after you change them? What a waste for that diaper! With cloth, you just wash it and reuse it. And when your child is out of diapers, you can sell the diapers and get a lot of your money back, without adding to a landfill.

As for storage, I keep ours in a drawer. We use pockets with prefolds and hemp inserts (the hemp is for the bedtime diapers). I'm sick of stuffing diapers though so for this baby I'm going to use mostly AIOs (but still some pockets for adjusted absorbency for bedtime). I'm going to buy most of them used also.