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Cloth Diapering
Considering switching to cloth....Advice???
Hello. I am considering switching my daugher to cloth diapers. I stay home with her and just didn't realize the cost of disposable diapers over time. She will be 8 months old on Friday and has started crawling around. Suddenly, she the diapers are rubbing her little legs. Is cloth diapering honestly a cost saver, even with washing costs? Do you recommend any brands, especially for a budget? Is it true it helps with potty training? I am exploring all my options right now. Thank you!
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Re: Considering switching to cloth....Advice???
If you can restrain yourself, it is honestly a $ saver! I have spent $300 on all BumGenius diapers, and have around 20 (getting the buy5get1free sales-which is going on right now buy the way and I got more of a discount with a coupon code at GoGoNatural.com, and a couple of times I got another free diaper on top of that). A lot of people use Tide detergent, and it is just 2 extra loads of laundry a week for me. I was spending $40 a month on diapers plus some, about $600 a year. Not to mention what I was spending on wipes, probably $20 every 2 months. I now use cloth wipes, and spent $20 on enough wipes to wash them every 3 days too. My DD is almost 3 and refuses to potty train.... I wish I would have started with cloth from the beginning with her and we would have saved sooo much money. We bought a handful when she was 18 months old, and decided to full time CD our son.
I got BumGenius because I didn't want to mess with prefolds (which are an even cheaper option) or fitteds AND need covers too. I started with their pockets (BG 4.0s), bought some of the Freetimes because I would have to stuff them, and then bought some more 4.0 because I like them more. I am just now branching out into other brands, Alva and Kawaii, which are actually cheaper and a lot of people like.
I still haven't actually started CDing yet since my babes are still inside so I am sorry that I cannot give you more specific advice, but when I was brand spakin' new to this board I benefited A LOT from the FAQ link at the top.
Prefolds with covers are going to be your most budget friendly option.
We're going with cloth diapers - and we're going to start out with prefolds + covers. We're debating on starting out with cloth, or going with Seventh Generation sposies until our son is in the "small" size.
I did the math, for newborn diapers, if we got 3 dozen prefolds, 5 covers from Green Mountain Diapers the cost would be $133.25. Assuming that our son uses 12 diapers a day over the course of two months (an estimation, our debate is over whether or not he'll actually stay that size for two months) he'll need about 720 diapers, or 5 packs of 144 from Amazon.com at $42.41. This comes out to about $210 dollars. I am confident that even factoring in doing a load of laundry every other day it's not going to make up that 66.75 in savings, just for the first two months. Granted, there are cheaper diapers out there than Seventh Generation, I'd just rather not put chemicals on my son's butt that cause toxic shock and that are a little nicer to the environment.
I've seen breakdowns that assuming your child uses diapers for 30 months disposables cost in the neighborhood of $2500 over the course of needing diapers. With cloth or reusables, you can spend as little or as much as you want, but probably (again over the course of 30 months) you should assume around $1500 https://www.dailyfinance.com/2011/02/08/disposable-vs-reusable-diapers-how-to-save/ Again, even with laundry, water, and energy costs I don't think you're going to be adding $1,000 to your bills assuming you're doing laundry as much as every other day.
There are other factors to consider, but CD is cheaper.