Fluff Mail

You're probably sick of Cloth Diapering talk and yet, here I am--at it again!

As I referenced before, I budgeted another $300 for cloth diapering for this year. Today, I spent half of my budget, $150. The plan is still to put $110.00 away per month from April-December of this year on the diaper savings.

Back to my fluff mail--aside from my general shopping addiction, I love getting mail. If you haven't already figured it out, fluff mail is a package of cloth diapering items. Since I spend so much of a part of my day diapering my 3 month old, it cheers me up when I see the fun patterns on the diaper covers. Even though swishing and spraying poopy diapers in the toilet can be gross at times, I don't really mind it. The savings is amazing and I no longer imagine the mountains of diapers in the landfill that are due to my contribution.

How could you NOT be cheered by patterns like this?

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Diapering: Budget Recalculation 1

Savings: $1000 per year

If it's one thing I've learned, people (especially moms) are opinionated about diapering. There are those in the disposable camps and those in the cloth diaper camps and the reasons for each vary.

We used disposable diapers for our first 3 kids. We considered cloth diapering with our 3rd, but we just couldn't get it together for many reasons. I did get the feedback from older moms that asked why I'd possibly WANT to cloth diaper when there are disposables available? They remember the cloth diapering age when it was the only option and it was messy and leaky. Their shock at my considering cloth diapering was, admittedly, an influence in not cloth diapering with my 3rd dd.

But cloth diapering is different today. There are so many alternatives and I've found them to be LESS leaky when you follow a good diapering system (yep, it's a whole system, not just a diaper). But just as no two moms would agree which disposable diaper is best, no two cloth diapering moms would agree on which cloth diapers are best.

And then there's the cost factor. I'm a mom on a budget, so cloth diapering is not just for the environment and the cute factor, but also because it's much less expensive. However, it's very easy to get caught up in the cute factor and you could end up spending just as much, if not more, on cloth diapering if you get caught up in the hype.

One way to watch your pennies is to keep track of your actual expenses. Fortunately, we received some Chinese prefolds in two different sizes and a medium diaper cover before we had our 3rd dd. I found a ProWrap AIO at a 2nd hand store in great condition for $6. And at Wal-Mart I discovered a 5 pack of Kushies AIOs for $40 (including tax) and they have proven to be great diapers. I've been making soakers (for overnight): one side is fleece and the other is terry cloth (from a towel) and those are costing me about $.50 each, and I need only 3 or 4. I need to buy a supply of snappys (I'm not using any right now because babyL is only 2 months old and doesn't move around much) and a couple diaper covers in the current size and a few in the larger size--grand total of $100 to get through the entire year for our newborn.

We have 4 girls under 6. Our 5.5 year old sleeps very heavy and still has accidents at night. Our 3.5 year old rarely has accidents, but we still put on pull-ups for the off chance. Our 2 year old tends to get wet at night, but is mostly potty trained during the day. We also have a 2 month old.

I calculated our costs of what we were spending on paper/disposable products for diapering (and I'm a bargain shopper who finds the low prices and buys generic when cheaper): $111.25 per month! Thus, the move toward cloth.

I won't be able to avoid buying wipes completely, but I have completely cut them out at home. I had some really inexpensive baby washcloths that were on clearance that I'm now using for wipes. I also have a bunch of flannel I'll cut and sew for wipes. My goal for the year is $20 for wipes.

But what about the cost of washing the diapers? Where does that factor in?

You can go to the FEMP website and download an excel spreadsheet to help calculate washer costs: Energy Cost Calculators.

I calculated our washer costs, and with 3 loads per week (max) X 52 weeks, the grand total is $27.00. Most of the diapers are air dryed and the rest are dried on low in an HE dryer.

After factoring in purchasing a couple overnight pull-ups for our 5.5 year old and a couple more training pants for our 2 year old, we will spend $200 to build our cloth diaper supply. Add $27.00 for the year in energy costs and another $70 for disposables + wipes (inevitable for certain times where a washer is unavailable, like camping) and our total expenses for this year are about $300. Compare this to what we were spending: $111.25 X 12 months = $1000 savings for the year.

Budget recalculation: After the initial investment of $300 in the first 3 months of 2008, we will put away 111.00 per month for the remainder of the year.

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And now to the earthy crunchy part of our choice:

Why Cloth Diapers

Aside from the economical aspect, these are some of our other reasons:
from ForEveryMother.com

Environmental concerns:

*18 billion disposable diapers are generated in the US as solid waste every year.
*1 ton of solid waste generated for every baby who uses disposables for the entire diapering period.
*disposable diapers contribute to 2-3% of the total solid waste in landfills and are 30% of the total non-biodegradable waste.
*disposable diapers do not degrade in landfills
*disposable diapers use more trees, land and produce more solid waste than cloth
*disposable diapers contain traces of dioxin, a known carcinogen.

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Kushies Cloth Diaper AIOs

I found Kushies at Wal-mart while shopping one day. There were only 2 packages of the Kushies (5 pack) and I'd never heard of them, but thought I'd pick them up to try at a whopping $37.95 (that's only $8 per diaper after tax!). I asked a couple CDing friends whether they thought the diapers were decent but most of the feedback I received was that, for the price, they probably aren't very good (the "you get what you pay for" adage).

I decided to try them anyway. I've now been using them for over a month and I have to say they work great for me. The first time using them, I didn't pull them snug around the leg and tighten them well, so they leaked. Initially, I was going to blame the diaper, but I kept trying them and found that they haven't leaked again.

I often use these at night with an additional soaker in the middle. Again, no leaks!

After doing a search on the internet for cost, I realize how very inexpensive they were and I'm off to Wal-Mart to discover whether there is still another package left.

PROS: *These diapers are very inexpensive and really do the trick!

*After washing every other day for a month, they still work great. I admit, though, that I don't typically dry them in the dryer, I just hang dry them in hopes they will last longer.

*With the fit, they should make it another 6-8 months, when dd gets close to 22 lbs.

CONS: *Be careful not to wash them with bright colored diaper covers, they will become stained from the wash. (Of course, I learned that as a newbie and just wanted to pass it along).

*They are supposed to fit 10-22 lbs, but I've found it's closer to 13 lbs when they fit the best. You can make them fit at 10 lbs, but you have to be sure to make the fasteners snug.

*With the 5 pack, you get 2 patterns and 3 solids. The two patterns are really cute, but as you might now with CDing alot of moms like the cute patterns and these aren't quite as fashionable.


COST: $8-13 per diaper, depending on where you purchase them. At Wal-Mart, they are approx $8 a diaper, at Babies R' Us they are about $10 per diaper and online they are $13 per diaper

Rating (out of 4):

Comments: These are great diapers! Not as fashionable or flashy, but very economical and worth the price.

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g diapers

I found out about the gDiapers over a year ago. They are advertised as flushable diapers with outer covers you just throw in the washer. I tried to find them at our local stores like Whole Foods and Vitamin Cottage, but they weren't carrying them yet. I didn't want to have to pay shipping every time I ordered diapers, so I gave up on the idea.

One year later, and one new infant later, they are now in stock locally. You can buy a kit of two diaper covers, 4 snap-in liners and 10 diapers for about $24-27. After the initial purchase, the cost is ~14.99 for 40 diapers, or ~$.37 per diaper. The cost is comparable to the higher line pull-ups like Huggies, which are generally $.31-.41, depending on the diaper size, size of the box you are purchasing, and where they are purchased.

Flushability: You might wonder, "really, they flush?" Here's how it works: You have to take the diaper material (which really looks like a giant maxi-pad) out of the inner liner (polyurethane coated nylon) that snaps into the diaper cover, then rip open both sides the outer material (which resembles the inside of a regular diaper) and dump the inner material into the toilet. The inner material is like toilet tissue and it does clump, so it's necessary to swirl it around to break it up. According to the directions, you can flush the outer meshy material as well, but the one time I tried, it clogged the toilet.

But never fear, even if you can't flush the diapers they are highly biodegradable and great for composting (wet only diapers). In our house, we flush the inside and toss out the outside of the diapers. In comparison to regular diapers, we're adding about 1/20th the volume of a regular diaper (it is really just a thin outer meshy covering to hold the other material in) to a landfill.

Pros: *This diaper is great for reducing garbage and landfill. As a mom of 4 (all of which are in some type of diaper from night time pants to all day diapers) this is really important to me. I shudder at the realization that my first two children used about 10,000 diapers each and it took me this long to cloth diaper and use the gDiapers.

*The diaper covers really are cute! However, I put them on backwards for quite some time (the g on the diaper goes in the BACK!) and they still worked well.

*The diaper covers can be used for cloth diapering as well. I snap in the liner and add a prefold where the gDiaper would typically go. When I'm out and about, I use the regular gDiaper liners.

*You can be as cool as Julia Roberts


Cons: *Throwing them in a diaper bag is tricky. I feel like I need to put them in a separate sanitary bag so the stuff rolling around the diaper bag doesn't get on the diaper liners.

*Price. Let's face it, if you watch for sales and clip coupons, they cost about twice as much as regular disposable diapers. As a mom on a budget, it's a pretty big con.

*Dumping poopy diapers. It's really just as messy as cloth diapers, which cost a ton less and don't tax the waste reclamation any more than sitting on the potty and flushing (unlike gdiapers, which increase the amount of paper product in the septic system). With a bm, you really do get messy tearing off the outside of the diaper to dump the inner contents and if you don't feel comfortable flushing the outside, it can get really messy.

*Finding the diapers. I'm fortunate that I live in a state that has a big population of earthy crunchy mammas and even then, the stores don't have a huge stock. If you have to order online, you have to factor in the shipping cost, which can add a couple cents per diaper.


Cost: Starter Kit (2 diaper covers, 4 liners and 10 diaper inserts) ~$24-27
Refills (40 diaper inserts) ~$15

Rating (out of 4):

Comments: They can be costly, but such a benefit to the environment! A great alternative for outings, especially for cloth diapering moms.

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