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Cloth Diapering
Why did you choose to CD?
Hello. I use disposables right now but have always been curious about CD. What is the main reason you CD? I originally thought it was better for the environment, but it seems that CD would use a lot of water and energy to heat the water? Thanks!
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Re: Why did you choose to CD?
Honestly---because they are cute and we were sick and tired of buying sposies.
We have 26 diapers and do laundry every 3 days. I line dry the diapers since it's the summer so we don't waste extra energy that way. I have a HE washer so it doesn't use a ton of water either. I would venture to say we use the washer the same amount as we did with sposies because we were always washing clothes that had poop all over them or sheets that had pee on them from his sposie leaking at night.
Maybe just try cloth diapering for a month and see how you like it. jilliansdrawers.com has a $10 try cloth program.
The water argument is faulty. Disposables use a lot of water and energy to create, and you need many, many, many more disposables than you do cloth. so yes, they use water, but so do disposables, and you are still reducing the amount of garbage in landfills.
I wanted to CD when I was pg for environmental reasons, but then chickend out when DD was actually born. Everyone said I wouldnt do it, too much laundry, etc, and my daycare wouldn't take it anyway. So we actually never used our newborn stash and I wound up selling it.
After I was laid off, I decided that since I was home, there was NO reason not to CD. No one to tell me I couldn't do it for whatever reason.
Another reason was that I was running low on diapers, sick of buying more, and I heard horror stories about Dry Max. Pampers were the only ones that worked for us, we had leaks with others, so I didnt want to be forced to use Dry Max.
*Eco-friendliness
*No cancer-causing chemicals on my baby's bum.
*No chemical smells every time he pees.
*No Pampers DryMax chemical burns.
*Saving a ton of money, even buying all the cute more expensive cloth diapers.
*It's super easy.
*They are adorable.
*Support Work At Home Moms instead of dishonest corporations.
I'm sure there are many more reasons, but those are off the top of my head. I love CDing.
1. To save money
2. Gentler on my baby's bottom
3. I believe it is better for the environment. (I only do 3 loads of diapers each week. I also line dry)
Thats pretty much my reasons too.
But, we still use sposies during the day sometimes since we bought the majority of his clothes before I even thought about CD so our CD's won't fit under his onesies. lol.
#1 - $$$$$$. We have 3 kids in diapers now (DS#1 just turned 3, DS#2 is almost 2, and DS#3 is 1mo). We spend $100/mo on sposies.
#2 - Environment. I'm sure we've put thousands of diapers in the landfill, since we JUST barely switched to CD's. Also, our garage (where the garbage can is) smells like poop from our diapers. Nasty.
While I was pg I had originally wanted to CD, but decided against it because in my apartment I can only run the washer or the dryer at any given time or the power will go out. I thought it would put me behind on laundry. (I don't think that now because really it's only a couple extra loads then what I already do.)
Now I'm switching because my DH is deploying soon-ish and I will be taking out the trash by myself. The majority of trash being taken out is her diapers.
I'm going to have to go down stairs, through a large parking lot and across a small street all with my baby while carrying the trash. So I decided I'd do myself a favor and make steps towards minimizing my waste out-put so I'll have less to take out when he's gone. DH was on board right away because he hates taking out the trash too.
For me it was 100% environmental. Like pp said, the water argument is faulty, disposables have a much greater environmental impact in their manufacturing & transport than the energy it takes to wash the diapers. Plus the added chemicals, plastics & waste you are adding to landfills (not to mention the chemicals & plastics against baby's bum!) The $$$ saving was an added bonus.
For my husband he was all about the $$ and the environmental aspect is the added bonus for him.
A host of reasons:
1. Less waste. Even DH, who is not a huge CD fan, hated to look at a trashcan full of disposable diapers when we were doing more sposies than CDs.
2. Cost. I got most of my diapers used (or prepped but never used) or as seconds, and I can reuse them until they fall apart or sell them if DD grows out of them. Much better than literally throwing away $20 every time we go through a pack of diapers.
3. Convenience. CDs are insanely easy to use, especially with all of the options available these days. And as someone once said, it's a lot easier to head down to the dryer to get out a clean CD than to argue with DH over who buys more diapers when you find out you ran out at 3am.
4. The challenge. CDs were a new concept to me and I wanted the challenge of wrapping my head around the options and figuring out what worked best for our family.
5. Comfort. Every time I put a paper diaper on DD (we do CDs about 90% of the time), I wonder how that could be comfortable compared to comfy cloth.
6. Cuteness. Seriously, there are some adorable patterns for CDs. I often will color-coordinate her CD with whatever top/onesie she's wearing. So cute, it can get addictive.
As for your water/energy argument, I would say it's either a wash or CDs come out slightly ahead. There's water and energy put into making disposable diapers (and you can't reuse them), I rarely run a full washer full of CDs (so I'm washing a medium/large load vs a super load), and I line dry them as often as I can, meaning I use less energy on the drying cycle.
My initial reasons:
1) The thought of throwing all those disposable diapers in a landfill makes me sick.
2) The thought of spending all that $$ on something you throw away also makes me sick.
Reasons we keep CDing:
1)No blow-out or leaks. Every time my daughter poops in a disposable it blows out the back. We do not have this problem with CDs.
2)No diaper rash.
3) It's easier than I thought I would be.
4) CDs are so cute.