Cloth Diapers.

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LittleJess

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I know this might be odd, but I'm really considering Cloth Diapers.

I'm just wondering, where would I actually buy some? I'm considering cloth diapers as they seem to be easier to hide and are reusable.
 
DrunkBear said:
I know this might be odd, but I'm really considering Cloth Diapers.

I'm just wondering, where would I actually buy some? I'm considering cloth diapers as they seem to be easier to hide and are reusable.

WHAT?! CLOTH DIAPERS!!!!!!!

Well, I love cloth diapers, so I'm all for it. "Easier to hide" is debatable, though. Have you thought about what you'll do with the wet ones while you're waiting to do laundry? For many, the laundry aspect of cloth diapers is a big challenge, secrecy-wise. But if you don't wear diapers all that often, then you may only need 2-3 cloth diapers in your rotation. So from that angle, yeah, they can be easier to hide--depending on your level of usage.
 
Cottontail said:
WHAT?! CLOTH DIAPERS!!!!!!!

Well, I love cloth diapers, so I'm all for it. "Easier to hide" is debatable, though. Have you thought about what you'll do with the wet ones while you're waiting to do laundry? For many, the laundry aspect of cloth diapers is a big challenge, secrecy-wise. But if you don't wear diapers all that often, then you may only need 2-3 cloth diapers in your rotation. So from that angle, yeah, they can be easier to hide--depending on your level of usage.

I'm debeating as if I should get cloth diapers or plastic pants (for my disposables)

Reason being is people tip my bins over on bin day, and I don't want diapers blowing all the way down the flipping street :D that and there always full, so It makes it hard to get rid of diapers and I hate leaving diapers in my room 2/3 weeks tops stinking :/

Because of druggies on my street, there is 50/50 chance of my bins getting tipped over by violent drunk people or those under the influence of drugs like meth. It's just a target as I'm middle class living in a poorer street.

PS, I've had drunken alcoholics crash in my front gate before, so there is that xD
 
If you're putting diapers in your trash bin, put them in black trash bags and tie the bags with a knot. Double bag if it's heavy and you're worried about it breaking. That way if the bins tip over, it's just black bags of trash, which nobody is going to inspect closely.

On the topic of the thread, I haven't tried cloth, only disposable, but I've heard good things from all the folks who have tried cloth, so I'd encourage you to try them if they sound appealing.
 
ArchieRoni said:
If you're putting diapers in your trash bin, put them in black trash bags and tie the bags with a knot. Double bag if it's heavy and you're worried about it breaking. That way if the bins tip over, it's just black bags of trash, which nobody is going to inspect closely.

On the topic of the thread, I haven't tried cloth, only disposable, but I've heard good things from all the folks who have tried cloth, so I'd encourage you to try them if they sound appealing.

That's something I already do, but stray cats also get into the bins, and for some reason people like to let there dogs roam the street and they seem to like to jump and try eat whatever is in the bin, thus knocking them over occasionally.

It gets quite annoying as I always have to put it in the bottom, to avoid them ending up on the street.
 
DrunkBear said:
I'm debeating as if I should get cloth diapers or plastic pants (for my disposables)

Reason being is people tip my bins over on bin day, and I don't want diapers blowing all the way down the flipping street :D that and there always full, so It makes it hard to get rid of diapers and I hate leaving diapers in my room 2/3 weeks tops stinking :/

Well, I guess meditate on the laundry thing some more. If you have your own laundry machines and can do a wash anytime, then no problemo. If you have a shared laundry and would be running the risk of other people moving your stuff around or seeing what you're washing, then cloth might not help you much with your privacy. It might make things worse, actually. But if you can get enough cloth diapers to meet your demand, then you'd probably be saving money pretty quickly.

A lot of people think, "I'll just wash these cloth diapers by hand and hang them up to dry," but--these things can take a looooooooooong time to dry, especially indoors on a rack, and especially if we're talking the all-in-one styles. I'm talking several days. Plus they get kinda stiff that way. Tumble-drying diapers is not only a gazillion times faster, it also softens them. So I guess my advice would be: Don't get into this thinking you'll be hanging your diapers up on a rack to dry. They'll dry so slowly that you'll need to buy three times as many to ensure that you always have dry ones ready.
 
Cottontail said:
Well, I guess meditate on the laundry thing some more. If you have your own laundry machines and can do a wash anytime, then no problemo. If you have a shared laundry and would be running the risk of other people moving your stuff around or seeing what you're washing, then cloth might not help you much with your privacy. It might make things worse, actually. But if you can get enough cloth diapers to meet your demand, then you'd probably be saving money pretty quickly.

A lot of people think, "I'll just wash these cloth diapers by hand and hang them up to dry," but--these things can take a looooooooooong time to dry, especially indoors on a rack, and especially if we're talking the all-in-one styles. I'm talking several days. Plus they get kinda stiff that way. Tumble-drying diapers is not only a gazillion times faster, it also softens them. So I guess my advice would be: Don't get into this thinking you'll be hanging your diapers up on a rack to dry. They'll dry so slowly that you'll need to buy three times as many to ensure that you always have dry ones ready.

That actually didn't come into mind, I wasn't aware they take forever to dry, I don't have a "dryer" yikes.
 
DrunkBear said:
That actually didn't come into mind, I wasn't aware they take forever to dry, I don't have a "dryer" yikes.

Yeah... In fairness to the various styles, some dry quickly while others don't. If you go old-school and get the flat kind of cloth diapers that you fold and pin, those'll dry quickly enough. And nobody who sees them hanging will know what they are! I have some flats that are made of a combination of bamboo and spandex. They're soft, stretchy, and super-absorbent. I'm not big into flats, but they're neat--for when I feel like something different. After that, you get into diapers that are sewn with many layers. I mostly wear "prefolds", which are also a pin-on style that requires separate plastic pants. Even in the dryer on high heat, they take a full hour to dry. The all-in-one styles, because they're hourglass-shaped and don't rely on folding, have a bunch of extra layers sewn in to compensate. And because they're waterproof on one side, they can only really dry out of the other side, so it takes positively forever to dry them without a dryer.

If you're still interested in investigating cloth, though, you might want to consider "pocket" diapers, which are basically an all-in-one with a removable pad that goes in a pocket inside. You can use anything for the pad, though, such as a towel, a flat baby diaper, etc. Since the pad comes out and can be anything absorbent, you can choose something that dries quickly. Just a thunk!
 
Shybug said:
That actually didn't come into mind, I wasn't aware they take forever to dry, I don't have a "dryer" yikes.

me neither, but i use 'nappies' (terry towelling). it's better to just buy standard towels for you then have a range of options:
size, and whether or not to cut-to-size (squared, usually) or just fold in two;
quality, for there are different weights/thickness (expressed in 'gsm', grammes per square metre. anything above 650gsm is advisable);
colours, if you choose;

and they're cheaper than the supposed proper inco products, and easier to excuse [your having them].

all you then need is plastic pants and a fastening method (i use mini-bungees; easy to fit and excuse, and more comfortable and safer than pins).
a liner is optional, but can be had as 'frost protection fleece' from any gardening goods supplier.

as for drying, i just hang mine up, in my room, on those plastic hangers you get free with clothes (the ones with the trouser clips) and cheap to buy clothes-hanging hooks for hanging from the door.
 
I wear cloth diapers. I have flat and contour diapers. I believe cloth diapers breathe better, feel more comfortable and are more economical because they are reusable. While true washing a load of wet diapers they smell, and if you wear diapers 24/7 the amount adds up. I wear 3 to 4 diapers a day, times 3 to 4 days = 12 to 16 diapers in the wash. Since I do all the laundry, washing and drying them is no problem, but can get tedious but necessary. I also wear plastic pants over my diaper, these need to be rinsed out and allowed to dry, they cannot be washed in the machine. Then there is the issue of hiding them under clothing. there is a visible diaper bump, and the plastic pants do crinkle when walking. Wearing a diaper under clothes (and using them) limit the time you are out and can only realistically be changed at home. However, if you put your used diaper in a plastic bag and in your diaper bag, changing is possible. I diaper myself by placing the diaper on the toilet, sitting on it, apply powder and pin it on. then pull up my plastic pants.
If you are wearing a disposable, there is still the issue of discarding the used one if you can find a trash can. Also, I hate filling the landfills with used diapers.
 
I've worn both cloth and disposable diapers over the past 30 years, and I've gradually settled on pocket diapers as a good all-around solution. I can usually wear a SnapEZ pocket diaper with a hemp insert for 2 to 3 hours before I need to be changed, and the diaper is thin across the hips and rear so it's almost undetectable under clothing.

Laundry is also simplified, since I can just rinse out an insert and wait to wash a number of them; the pocket diapers themselves can be washed with the inserts.

The drawback is the expense involved, which runs to $50 to $60 per diaper. At present, I have 10 SnapEZ pocket diapers and 13 of their adult-sized hemp inserts. I probably have $600 invested. I can double up the inserts at night, and I only have to wash every couple of days.

My contour and regular prefolds haven't been used in some time. I just don't have the time for pins and plastic pants, and neither is required with pocket diapers.
 
Cottontail said:
A lot of people think, "I'll just wash these cloth diapers by hand and hang them up to dry," but--these things can take a looooooooooong time to dry, especially indoors on a rack, and especially if we're talking the all-in-one styles. I'm talking several days.

Ahah, this is me! I hand wash my cloth diapers and hang them to dry indoors!


It's true the AIOs take several days to dry, but I just usually use pocket diapers, which the cover takes 1 day and the insert 2 maybe 3 which is not a big problem.



I tend to prefer disposables as I identify them more with what a diaper is but I'm a big fan of pocket diapers. They're similar to disposables, they're practical and it's what most babies today wear as cloth diapers, and anything that makes me feel as baby or toddler today is what I tend to naturally gravitate towards.
 
Ok thanks guys and girls :)

I'm going to put off cloth diapers until I get my own house. Plastic pants and disposables for now.

- Jess.
 
If you're stressed about laundering or disposing nappies, why don't you just use a towel. It's very easy to fold a towel into a useful and comfortable nappy. Then you can wash it and hang it out and no one will be any the wiser. Since you already have plastic pants, you only have to grab some pins. Problem solved, unless you have a large waist.
 
ArchieRoni said:
If you're putting diapers in your trash bin, put them in black trash bags and tie the bags with a knot. Double bag if it's heavy and you're worried about it breaking. That way if the bins tip over, it's just black bags of trash, which nobody is going to inspect closely.
Do you have any idea how much on weeks worth of used diapers weighs? For me I bet 80 lbs of my weekly trash would be diapers. I have been using cloth prefolds at night and on weekends so that gets the weight down to about 45 lbs of used diapers a week
 
I wanna suggest this as a solution. Observations:
- Disposables tend to leak while you are wetting. This is because of what I will call puddling. The disposable cannot absorb your pee-pee as fast as you let it out. Since your pee-pee puddles in your disposable, it will run down your leg and cause embarrassing wet "half moon" wet spots on your pants.
- Clothe diapers wick your pee-pee fast enough so your reduce your risk of leaking to a true over-saturation condition. But, thick cloth diapers take a long time to dry even with a clothes dryer. Cloth diapers do not have odor control additives so they will smell after a day. Than means doing laundry every couple of days.
Solution: Buy a couple of packs of thick real cloth baby diapers from Target or Babies are Us or Buy Buy Baby. Use a couple of the cloth baby diapers as stuffers in your disposable. This give you a great cloth diaper feeling, low risk of leaking, easy to wash smaller clothe diaper, and the smaller cloth diaper is a little easier to conceal in your room or apartment. If someone happens to see your baby cloth diaper hanging out for drying, simple respond by saying they make great cleaning rags.

Also use juvenile print duct from Walmart to fortify the disposable diaper tabs. I love the Disney "Frozen" designer duct tape.
 
Billaby said:
I wanna suggest this as a solution. Observations:
- Disposables tend to leak while you are wetting. This is because of what I will call puddling. The disposable cannot absorb your pee-pee as fast as you let it out. Since your pee-pee puddles in your disposable, it will run down your leg and cause embarrassing wet "half moon" wet spots on your pants.
- Clothe diapers wick your pee-pee fast enough so your reduce your risk of leaking to a true over-saturation condition. But, thick cloth diapers take a long time to dry even with a clothes dryer. Cloth diapers do not have odor control additives so they will smell after a day. Than means doing laundry every couple of days.
Solution: Buy a couple of packs of thick real cloth baby diapers from Target or Babies are Us or Buy Buy Baby. Use a couple of the cloth baby diapers as stuffers in your disposable. This give you a great cloth diaper feeling, low risk of leaking, easy to wash smaller clothe diaper, and the smaller cloth diaper is a little easier to conceal in your room or apartment. If someone happens to see your baby cloth diaper hanging out for drying, simple respond by saying they make great cleaning rags.

Also use juvenile print duct from Walmart to fortify the disposable diaper tabs. I love the Disney "Frozen" designer duct tape.

The funny thing for me was considering the opposite for "feel" reasons. I have tried cloth several times while awake and like the wicking action as mentioned. It is the only time my diaper really gets wet all around but still does not leak. But as a DL, the feel is just not quite right. My thought, use a disposable stuffer or insert that will give the disposable the squishy feel I desire, yet have the wicking capacity of the cloth. I think this would be a great solution for side and stomach sleepers.

Yes cloth does take a good hour plus in the dryer. Also better if drying with multiple items to maximize speed. Hang drying also leaves it feeling stiffer.
 
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