What do you use to wash your little ones?

[melissel]

I've tried different natural-type products on my DDs, and my older DD seems to react to most of them. (I tried four different kinds of sunscreen and we had problems with every single one, darn it!) So I'm trying to get away from the Johnson's stuff that my mom (who bathes the kids a lot) likes, but I also don't have money to spend $6 on a little bottle of baby wash.

What do you all use? Are there some natural alternatives? When I used Dr. B's, DD1 complained that it made her genital area sore, even just from it being in the bath. I also use the Johnson's stuff on their hair, so what can I do there? I can't handle no-poo (at least for myself), so I don't think that's an option until I have some more time my hands (hopefully June, if everything works out as planned).

Man, it's a sad state of affairs when only the mass-marketed, chemical-laden stuff is working for my kids!

TIA

[momto l&a]

Water most of the time. Once a week they may get soaped up. If so its just what we use for ourselves which is Ivory.

I cant Dr B's, its leaves a film on my body and I feel awful the rest of the day.

I have washed my hair with Bi-O-Clean dish soap when out camping and I loved how my hair felt. Dh used it also and like it.

[Spastica]

Perhaps you can buy a perfume/dye free liquid detergent soap, similar to the Johnson's products, but without all the other junk. Get a super mild, non-anti-bacterial formula. You can use baking soda water too with some drops of olive oil to keep it moisturizing. Olive oil is wonderful for babies' and children's skin (adults too!).

You can also try regular castile soap or liquid castile soap without the fragrances and dyes. Natural soaps can be harsh and do leave a film on your skin or hair (that needs to be rinsed off with ACV rinses), so it's no wonder your child gets irritated. It's the reason why detergent soaps were made, but I'm sure there will be somebody here screaming at me for that comment

[calebsmama03]

I use either CA baby unscented or Jason/Earths Best Organics body wash - both are tear free w/o numbing agents. THe Jason has a few chemically ingredients, but no parabens or other *really* nasties. It is about $6 a bottle BUT I only use the teeniest amount - really just to wash hands and diaper area. Hair is only "washed" once a week otherwise just rinsed with water. One bottle of Jason's will last us 3-4 months! I don't really think kids need a lot of soap - just a good soaking is often enough. We have fewer rashes and not so dry skin this way, too

[bendmom]

I have always used Nature's Gate Rainwater baby wash/shampoo. It's cheaper than the other all natural products, and it's a big bottle. I am ordering a bottle of Aura Cacia's baby wash from the Frontier co-op for almost half of what Wild Oats charges. Can you make an order through a co-op, or find the Rainwater wash?

[moderngal]

CA Baby works great for us.
I love bath products, so we also rotate the Kiehl's, Aveda, Burt's Bees, and Anthony.

[Mommay]

I still have bottles of my baby oh baby shampoo and body wash left. I really like the smell. But since reading about honey as a facial cleanser, I've been using just honey on his body and hair (plus bs for the hair). If the hair's wet, there's no problem working it right in. Ds is tickled that I wash him with honey. I let him taste it before I wash him sometimes.

[deliarose]

I was going to say that you can make your own sunblock with shea butter and zinc oxide. My friend organized this for a bunch of us this summer. It is great.

As far as cleansers, I would check out Dr. Bronner's baby soap and see how that affects your dd.

[Lilacmoon]

Nature's Gate Rainwater works well, sometimes I use a gentle lavendar/ goats milk soap that a friend makes.. I have to careful of the face though.

[SageR]

Just a little vegetable based soap on his diaper area, conditioner on his scalp, and water for everything else. His skin never ever gets dry and he has never had any kind of rash! Also, I do not bathe his entire body everyday. His face and hands get a h2o wipedown after eating, and his diaper area gets a wash with every change and then I stick his bum under the tap at night on the days he has no bath. Kids do not need to bathe every day.

If I were to choose on company to buy baby products it would be Aubrey Organics. They have an excellent rep.

[cottontail]

Originally Posted by deliarose

I was going to say that you can make your own sunblock with shea butter and zinc oxide. My friend organized this for a bunch of us this summer. It is great.

As far as cleansers, I would check out Dr. Bronner's baby soap and see how that affects your dd.

Do you know the ratio of zink oxide to shea butter to do this? Summer is right around the corner here in Austin......

If I use a soap on DD, I use Burt's baby soap or Doc B's baby. Most of the time she's a water baby.

[Llyra]

DD just uses diluted Dr. Bronners, the same as what we all use.

[Wild Flowers]

My kids are dirty They really only use water, for hair also. Every once in awhile I scrub them down with my salt scrub, which is just almond oil, salt and some eos. In their bath they have epsom salts and some eo, depending on time of day and their mood. But really, they are decently clean.

[crunchy_mama]

Mostly water, or Dove soap. Laundry soap is All Free and Clear as of now.

[UlrikeDG]

Mostly just water. If they're really dirty, I'll use some of the suds from washing their hair on the rest of their bodies. I only wash their hair when it looks or smells dirty. I do use mainstream shampoos on them, because I've never found a "natural" 'poo that I liked for my own hair.

[jother]

Not only do we worry w/ the chemicals, but have to deal w/ food allergies too. A lot of natural based products have a zillion ingredients or have nut/seed, corn etc.....

We use Nature's gate baby shampoo~love the smell!
DD use a tad of the white conditioner...can't remember the name
We to use Dr. Bronner's baby soap in the bottle VERY diluted or you can use the bar, we also use kiss my fave 100% olive oil bar soap. My hubby still uses dove. I use hardy anything on the baby, little to no soap/lotion, so far she has the best skin yet!

[velcromom]

Another water-washing mama here! My ds reacted to commercial products too, so I just stopped using them and spending money searching for something that would work, buying different things all the time. I pared our baby products down to water, weleda baby cream for diaper rash, and after he was a little older, castile soap if he was dirty. For hair, I would suds up the bar and just used a little of it on his hair, after he was old enough to deal with the rinsing process. I make the soap, so the only real expense is the weleda cream.

I do like the idea of a simple homemade sunscreen, I'll have to look into that... probably for myself and my four year old; with this California heat, our sun-avoidance methods for babies have a lot to do with simply covering up or staying in the shade!

[Pen]

Mostly water and a wash cloth. Once a week or so we use jojoba oil on the little one and once a month or so a very dilute bs/acv for her hair. If we are stuck we use olive oil. Sometimes we add so EO's. (so far only lav for the little one) The older one who gets VERY dirty climbing trees all day and digging to China (I can only assume based on the amount of dirt) gets more BS and a bath for each continent explored. We still use jojoba oil on his face. For hands after coming in from play we use very dilute Dr. B's on both.

[aiccerb]

We usually just use water on the kids during the week and my cetaphil when they need a bit more of a cleaning I rub a bit of olive oil on two of them fairly regularily after their baths because of dry skin and unrefined shea butter on the third one who has eczema.

[sparkeze]

We've always used Aubrey's, although at the moment we're using CA Baby. For us a bottle of Aubrey's would last 6 mos+ so the cost didn't seem like that big of a deal. I buy it online from a vitamin site and it's 30% off or something like that.