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May 2023 Moms
hestia-is-wearie
member
Product Spotlight: Diapering
hestia-is-wearie
member
(format copied from March 2023)
Each week we'll spotlight a new category of product. Feel free to comment on threads like these throughout your time at the board, not just when they're in their week in the spotlight, if you discover something new OR are new to the board. This week it's.... Diapering!!
Each week we'll spotlight a new category of product. Feel free to comment on threads like these throughout your time at the board, not just when they're in their week in the spotlight, if you discover something new OR are new to the board. This week it's.... Diapering!!
FTMs are encouraged to ask questions & STM/+s encouraged to share their knowledge based on experience. You can use any or all the prompts relevant to you below to share info in an easy-to-read format. Pictures/screen grabs, if put in spoilers, are welcome!
FTMs
FTMs
- Do you want to use Disposable, Cloth, or a combination?
- Any brands your looking at?
- What are your goals? I.E save money, go green/reduce toxins, ect.
- Any other questions for STM+
STM+
- Did you use disposable, cloth, or a combination?
- What brand/s do you like?
- pros and cons
- Any diapering accessories you recommend?
- Tips for night sleep
- Tips for preventing and dealing with diaper rash.
- Any other tips you can give FTM.
- Questions about other diapers you're looking at, or struggles your having/had.
Next Week: ...something. March 23 has a wonderfully organized spreadsheet that I plan to repurpose for our board. Thanks @miss_lynn9 for letting May 23 borrow it!
- Any brands your looking at?
- What are your goals? I.E save money, go green/reduce toxins, ect.
- Any other questions for STM+
STM+
- Did you use disposable, cloth, or a combination?
- What brand/s do you like?
- pros and cons
- Any diapering accessories you recommend?
- Tips for night sleep
- Tips for preventing and dealing with diaper rash.
- Any other tips you can give FTM.
- Questions about other diapers you're looking at, or struggles your having/had.
Next Week: ...something. March 23 has a wonderfully organized spreadsheet that I plan to repurpose for our board. Thanks @miss_lynn9 for letting May 23 borrow it!
Re: Product Spotlight: Diapering
Get a butt spatula and keep diaper cream on hand, even if you don't need it.
If your home has multiple levels (or even multiple areas you frequent) get a basket of diapering essentials in each area. For instance, our home has a main level and a basement. We have diapers and wipes in the basement, the living room, our bedroom and the nursery.
I always know my PP mental health is in decline when I struggle to change a diaper MOTN. When baby is tiny, you just have to change it at every wake up to help squeeze out any extra sleep you can.
I also think it's important to note that I really wanted to cloth diaper my first. All over these board (back in 2016/2017) everyone was cloth diapering and really talked poorly about disposables. And if cloth diapering works for you, that's great! But do recognize that this is a small, sometimes homogenous corner of the internet and it's *totally normal* to not cloth diaper if you realize that's not for you. You're not killing the environment. You're not poisoning your kid's butt.
But like, hats off to the cloth diaperers. Seriously impressive time dedication!
Disposable, but we used cloth diapers for swim.
- What brand/s do you like?
I really liked Huggies Little Snugglers to start because they have a blowout pocket in the back! Once DD was more active with more solid poops, we switched to Pampers Cruisers, then Pampers Cruisers 360s when she got too impatient for diaper changes. The 360 style looks like a pull-up and was a great transition to potty training, when I put her in cloth training underwear. DD now wears pull-ups overnight only. For the swim diaper, we used Charlie Banana brand.
- pros and cons
It took a little trail and error, but I had generally good experience with the diapers I used. I would say regardless of brand, the weight range of each diaper size might not be accurate for your baby: mine was always sizing up well before the label said she should. All babies are built differently and mine had a stockier diaper area!
- Any diapering accessories you recommend?
Dog poop bags on the changing table for those really messy ones! Huggies Natural wipes can be pulled out with one hand, which is huge. We also started out using a regular trash can but ended up getting a diaper genie. Trust me, you'll want one.
- Tips for night sleep
Um...I don't know.
- Tips for preventing and dealing with diaper rash.
Fortunately DD didn't get diaper rash very often: only if we waited too long to change a poopy diaper. Balmex was the best rash cream we used because it is so thick. We started with Desitin but it got everywhere.
- Any other tips you can give FTM.
Swim diapers are only made to hold poop. I personally don't see the point in wipe warmers. We knew it was time to size up when DD had multiple pee leaks. Breastfed baby poop smells like buttered popcorn!
- Questions about other diapers you're looking at, or struggles your having/had.
None for now!
- Did you use disposable, cloth, or a combination?
- What brand/s do you like?
- pros and cons
- Any diapering accessories you recommend?
you don’t have to change diapers in the middle of the night as often as you think. Also I keep a changing pad liner under the bassinet with some diapers so I could do changes on my bed.
- Tips for preventing and dealing with diaper rash.
- Any other tips you can give FTM.
you don’t have to wipe every time if it’s just pee! Put a changing table on the first floor if you have a multistory house. We had a collapsible one that was great.
- Questions about other diapers you're looking at, or struggles your having/had.
DD #2: May 2020
Baby #3: EDD May 2023; MC October 2022
- What brand/s do you like? I tried out a bunch but settled on the Canadian brand la petite ourse as my favorite as it was good quality but set at a decent price point. I use the pocket style diapers mostly. Tried out a few all in ones and some of the covers + liner type, but the pocket style were what we settled on a liking the best and use the most of.
- pros and cons: pros... We never run out of diapers as they're just a quick wash cycle away from being refilled. Environmental stuff I guess.... Long term I guess it could be cheaper once we get into using them on kiddo #2. Oh and less blow outs!! Once we switched to using our cloth diapers, we had way less poop blow outs.
Cons.... The extra laundry and time spent stuffing the diapers. I usually just do it while watching tv, so it's not that bad.
- Any diapering accessories you recommend? Diaper pail! No matter what you will have a stinky Paul, but it at least helps contain the stench mostly. We got the ubbi diaper Pail mainly as I didn't want to have to use special bags and thought I would switch to using it for our cloth... Still using it for the overnight disposable diapers though.
If you do cloth diaper, you will need a sprayer once you switch to real foods. Breast fed baby poop is water soluble, so could go right in the wash, but once you start solids, you'll have to spray your poopy diapers off into the toilet.
We also got a wipe warmer... Not sure it makes a difference having them warm, but we use cloth wipes, so needed something to put them in anyways.
We have a change pad in our nursery.... One thing I would say is you don't need one with the straps to strap your kiddo in... We have them, never use them and I seem to recall trying them a few time just to have them be in the way and super not useful.
- Tips for night sleep. Change/ check the diaper first then do your feed. Also, not a diaper thing, but if you can get your hands on the sleepers with a zipper in between the legs, it makes diaper changes so much easier and baby gets less cold/ angry.
- Tips for preventing and dealing with diaper rash. We didn't have to deal too much with diaper rash, but keep your babes bum dry and changed often helps prevent. I loved the earth mama diaper balm as it's cloth diaper friendly and seems to do the job for the small redness we did deal with. We did have one episode of a worse rash (daycare not changing her often enough) and had to switch to disposables and a zinc oxide based rash cream for a week to get her better.
- What brand/s do you like? We used luvs for a long time until they started getting a chemical-y smell to them to me, then we used target
- pros and cons - idk? They were cheap and didn’t leak?
- Any diapering accessories you recommend?
- Tips for night sleep - uhhh do whatever it takes to survive? Lol. Honestly, I don’t remember.
- Tips for preventing and dealing with diaper rash. My son responded really well to aquaphor for this.
- Any other tips you can give FTM.
- Questions about other diapers you're looking at, or struggles your having/had.
- Did you use disposable, cloth, or a combination?
Combination. I do cloth during the day and disposable at night and on some outings.
- What brand/s do you like?
- pros and cons
Pro of cloth diapers: you never have to worry about running out.
- Any diapering accessories you recommend?
For cloth, you will make your life so easy by getting diaper liners to catch the poo and just throw it away. I’ve done the sprayer and just rinsing in the toilet. The liners are a dream. Alva Baby’s bamboo liners are super soft and catch everything.
- Tips for night sleep
Try and get that last diaper change a decent bit after the last feed so baby can sleep with a dry diaper. Mine at least wakes in the middle of the night if his diaper gets too wet.
- Tips for preventing and dealing with diaper rash.
Prevention is being proactive. As soon as it’s a little red, give that toosh some love. Keep it clean and dry. I use Earth Mama’s diaper cream and Dr. Brenner’s ointment. Both have worked very well and haven’t impacted my cloth diapers at all.
- Any other tips you can give FTM.
Know what you can handle. And find your groove. You’ve got a long road of diapers ahead.
- Questions about other diapers you're looking at, or struggles your having/had.
Also, a portable folding changing mat is great to have on hand in case you need to change the baby at the park, grandma's house, etc.
@BourbonBiscuits I agree that it's important to normalize whatever kind of diapering method parents choose to use. I felt a lot of pressure to cloth diaper before I got pregnant with DD but I don't regret my decision to do disposable. I forgot where I read this, but even though disposable diapers take forever to break down, they don't take up that much space in the landfill by volume. And I think it was my potty training book that said one fewer year of disposable diapers on a baby has a similar environmental benefit to planting one tree. I've planted 10 trees on my property, so I think I'm covered.
- What brand/s do you like? Both of my kids have very sensitive skin. Pampers and Huggies would give them rashes, even the hypo/nonscented ones. Until last month, we were also huge fans of HB @BourbonBiscuits but just tried out Sam's Club brand. Still hypo, and unscented and working well for my 1 year old. May be trying those for NB, also may go back to HB as the online ordering is super convenient.
- pros and cons - a bit pricey I thought, I did a spreadsheet of unit count and in 2020/2019 they were a bit pricier and are much more than Sam's Club. But I haven't been able to find a more common brand, Huggies, Luvs, Pampers that don't lead to a skin reaction for my kids.
- Any diapering accessories you recommend? Butt spatula for sure. Also get a travel one that comes in a case for diaper bags. I have a diaper organizer that attaches to our changing table/dresser that is awesome Amazon.com: XL Hanging Diaper Caddy Organizer – Reinforced Diaper Stacker for Crib that Keeps Shape – Hanging Diaper Organizer for Changing Table, Playard, Wall & Door – Diaper Holder for Newborn Baby Girl & Boy : Baby
Out house is 2 stories and we are mainly downstairs, I had a folding table for my oldest, but with my youngest I just have the PNP (pack n play) set up with a changing pad and diaper caddy. Seconding two stations if your house is similar. Can be done/easily/cheaply for sure! We used the floor at the very beginning, but when my mom would come over it would hurt her back so we made a change.
- Tips for night sleep I don't have any diapering tips, but the pajamas, okay suits that either zip up from the bottom or 2 way zipper are the best! SNAPS ARE AWFUL AND NOT YOUR FRIEND
- Tips for preventing and dealing with diaper rash. I used Desitin max strength. I had a few samples/gifts I used but nothing every compared. Desitin daily defense is garbage IMO, you almost have to pat dry because it won't go on wet. Aquaphor also works great as well.
- Any other tips you can give FTM. Once baby is older and more mobile, keep some toys to keep them occupied for changes. I would keep some pop it tubes or rattles around. Especially around 6-8 months when they're in the alligator wrestling stage.
- Questions about other diapers you're looking at, or struggles your having/had.
DD #2: May 2020
Baby #3: EDD May 2023; MC October 2022
- What brand/s do you like? Seventh generation & honest company for disposables (the only brand my little handle the best. But for cloth diapers Alva is the cheapest yet still great quality.
- pros and cons: disposable cost more in the end, especially since prices have gone up a lot. Cloth diapers is a lot up front but last until potty training!
- Any diapering accessories you recommend? Puppy training pads under your baby. Don’t buy the ones marketed for babies they cost way more for only a few sheets.
- Tips for night sleep: soft music, over night diaper with a liner (helps them not feel so wet). There are disposable ones but it totally helps in my opinion.
- Tips for preventing and dealing with diaper rash. Calmospetine (might have spelt it wrong) best diaper cream that helped saved my daughter from the chemical burns she got from diapers and her urine mixing.
- Any other tips you can give FTM: take care of yourself, let others step in for a moment so you can sleep so you can be a better you even if it’s for 30 minutes. It makes all the difference in the beginning.