Daddy's Cloth Diaper Thoughts

Watching for Daddy to come home

Cloth diapering is truly a family decision. I secretly hope that Baby Z will pause from playing with her shopping cart and make that scrunchy face and grunt, all at the exact moment that Daddy's car pulls in the driveway. Then when she waddles over to him with that goofy "Daddy's home" smile and he gets a nice whiff, he'll have to take one for the team.

In our house that means we have to be on the same page about our diapers. We both have our personal favorites, our own tips and tricks, and I have learned that I have to communicate with him instead of just expecting he'll know how it all works. For instance, I watched a few great fit videos that others recommended and didn't think to share the tips with him right away. After a poor fitting diaper once or twice, I remembered to show him what I learned. The same goes for visits from Grandma or teaching the babysitter. It doesn’t matter who it is, if they’re going to be involved in the diapering in your household, you need them to be on the right team!

I asked Daddy if he'd share his thoughts on cloth diapering to give other families some insight and he was all on board:

Were you on board with cloth diapers from the start? Oh yes, I like saving money. Who doesn't? We did a cost comparison before the baby was here and it was an obvious decision to me. I was a little bit nervous about actually knowing how to use them, but we were able to learn about the different types from a demonstration class and I realized how simple they really are. To me, I don't really find them any harder to use than a disposable diaper.

What do you like about cloth diapering? Did I mention that I like saving money? The cost savings has been great and I know it will get even better when we are able to use them again for our second child. I also feel good knowing I'm not throwing all of those diapers out. We've used disposables here and there for trips when we didn't have a reliable washing option and I didn’t enjoy it. Not just the waste, but the smell of disposables even bothered me. It was also the only time we've had to deal with diaper rash. It confirmed for me that we made the right choice.

Is there anything that has surprised you about cloth diapering? It took us a little bit to figure out the best way to wash them. I didn’t realize that washing machines were so different and we had some trial and error. Now we have the routine taped up in the laundry room so anyone can follow it. All of the different types surprised me too, but once I learned about them and figured out which ones I thought were the easiest, it wasn’t a big deal.

What's your favorite type of cloth diaper? If you would have asked me right when Baby Z was born I would have definitely said all-in-ones. There was so much poop then! An impressive amount really. A nice all-in-one with velcro and changing her was a snap. Now that she's older I'd say I'm more on the side of all-in-two's. I like that we can reuse the same shell several times during the day now that there's less poop. It's just easy to snap a new insert in. Pockets can be great at night too because you can stuff so much in them. I might be known to stuff a little more than needed, but I figure as long the diaper still fits then no harm right? Really, I’m impressed with myself that I remembered all of those types. Did I get the names right? (Yes, he did. Good work Daddy!)

There you have it, daddy's thoughts on cloth diapering. Anything your family has learned as a cloth diaper team?