Remember when we began our cloth diaper journey?

Cai was about 3 months old at that point and we began using cloth diapers! It was wonderful! I loved how soft and comfy they were and they just looked so cute on that tiny bottom. He was only being breastfed so you didn't have to deal with gross real food poop, because you could throw the entire poopy into the washing machine. Plus, we were going through a ginormous stash of diapers at this age and I loved that I wasn't throwing money away, per say.

But then, we started having problems. I got mildew in our diapers twice. It was my own fault. I was busy and forgot them in the wash for too long once or twice, and then must not have gotten it completely out. I was using the wrong detergent on them, and didn't realize the effects until too late.

I really felt like a cloth diaper failure. I have some very strong perfectionist tendencies, so this was really hard for me to face. I also had to face my pride that "my perfect way of doing things, wasn't so perfect."

I decided that I didn't want to completely give up on them, when I could try again and work on improving my methods. So that's what I did. I compared our water bills from one month of not using them and then 2 months later. There was about a $30 - $40 difference for us, using front loading energy efficient machines. Then, you add in the cost for a more expensive detergent to wash them in, and the time it takes to actually wash and dry them, and re-stuff them, and well, for us it didn't feel like it was worth it.

I really wouldn't use them too much when running errands, because I didn't want to have to deal with the poop on the go, even with using a wet/dry bag that was smaller in my diaper bag. I wouldn't use them on Sunday at church, because I didn't want the nursery workers to deal with a cloth diaper. Then, there were the times when Cai was sick and got a yeast rash, or diaper rash, despite using cloth, and I needed to use a cream that I couldn't use with cloth diapers, because it messes them up. Those were all times I was using a disposable diaper, and not cloth.

I was encouraged that changing my methods did actually work and I didn't get mildew in them anymore, but now we were using them, and I got so. dang. tired. of. the. scrapping. the poop. off. of. the. diapers.

I would get it on my hands, no matter what my method of getting it off. And when they start eating real food, that poop is nasty.

I was discouraged, because you only hear of success stories and people just LOVING cloth diapers. I remember that feeling...it just faded.

The tree hugger in me loved that I was not dumping a bunch of diapers into the earth that would take 100's of years to decompose, but the daily in's and out's of dealing with cloth was also hanging in the balance in the back of my mind.

What should we do?!

Well, for now, we are giving up taking a break from cloth diapering.

We cloth diapered for 9 months.

We are going to hold onto our cloth and we are going to press on. It's rather likely that after Micaiah is not breastfeeding anymore, his poop will become, for lack of a better term, more "terd-like." A breastfed baby will always have more liquidy stools. And then, I may revisit cloth diapering.

I also want to keep them and start using them again when he gets a little older, because then we can start using them for potty training. A cloth diapered baby, in general, potty trains faster, than a baby in disposables. It's more like underwear and they can tell a bigger change when wet or dirty, like in real underwear. Yeah, the stuff you say and learn when being a mom. 

Cloth diapers are also wonderful when you have more than 1 child in diapers or subsequent children. I plan to cloth diaper again, especially in those early months. Cloth diapers are GREAT for swimmer (and we will be using them in the pool for now).

So, for all of you that doubted our cloth diaper adventure, the ones I in my family, I had to literally pull teeth to convince...pat yourself on the back and say "I told you so" to yourself, not to me, because part of me doesn't like that I am giving up for now.

Cloth Diapers...The End

Cloth Diaper Fail?

I'm contemplating giving up our cloth diapering. I feel like a failure!!!! But after weighing the costs, it might actually be cheaper NOT to cloth diaper anymore.

I say "anymore", because I do believe it WAS cheaper to cloth diaper my son for the last 5 months. We started cloth diapering at 3 months. Now he is almost 9. The amount of  daily diapers you use from 3 months to 9 does drop considerably over time. 

After we had some mildew in my diapers, I bleached, sunned, stripped, and soaked and washed again and again. They are cleaned and ready to go again, but I've been using disposables in the mean time. We just use the Target brand of diapers and now that Micaiah's older we just don't go through THAT many diapers a day. If we use only disposables, then we might go through one box per month. A box of Target Size 4's are $20.99 for 128. That's $.16 a diaper.

Yes, the convenience of disposables is nice, but I wasn't completely sold that it was cheaper.

Then, we got our water bill. With using disposables only for one month, our water bill came down from $80 to $44. And I have front loading, energy efficient machines.

Um, that's my box of diapers right there (and wipes).

I think we live in a costly water area. So, for many, it would be wiser to cloth diaper and it would be better, but it may be better for our family to stop cloth diapering.

I may give it one more try, and see how much our water bill goes up. I know I had a lot of extra washing last month, because I was really sanitizing them to get them all clean again, so I'm sure it was higher for the month, because of that. AND, if I sell them, I really am giving up cloth diapering our next baby, which would be essentially "free". I do believe we want to have another baby at some point, so weighing the costs is difficult. There really are pros and cons to both sides and I'm just not sure at this point what I want to do! Do you guys have any encouragement to keep going? Or should I let them go?