Cloth Diapering Pictures...

Ok, So I tried to upload these close to chronological order. I need to take some more recent pics in her Gro Baby's! While I am pretty sure most of her covers would still actually fit, I've retired them rather than buy more prefolds to use in them. So for now (as long as i can contain myself from buying more CDs!) all we use are the Gro Baby's.

6 Days Old in a Gro Baby.


3 Days old in a cover made by my friend Brooke. You can visit her Etsy Shop.



3 Days Old in an XS Thirsties Cover. (Thirsties are my favorite covers!)



2 Days Old in a preemie Imse Vmse cover. (I liked these, but C outgrew them fast. Great for a smaller baby, I'd think...)



10 Days old in another XS Thirsties Cover



8 Days old in a Gro Baby. I used two booster pads instead of a snap-in soaker for a trimmer fit. Worked great! (I still do that in a pinch if it's laundry day!)



15 Days old. This is an Orange Edged Green Mountain Diaper Prefold. These were great! This is what she is wearing under most of the covers. We mostly jus trifolded into the cover (no pins or snappis needed), but we occasionally snappied (shown here). Snappi-ing is the new pinning. Sooo Easy! I never got REALLY good at doing folds with snappis, but I'm sure if I had practiced I would've gotten it!



15 Days old in a Gro Baby.



16 Days old, in another creation by Brooke! Love it!! :) My Lil fan!



18 days old, in a Thirsties Duo Size One. Sooo excited about these new covers. As I said in my last post, if I were to do it all over again, I would just use prefolds & covers. And if I was going to do that, i would stock up on Thirsties Duos. They are not a one size cover, but almost! This cover snaps down to what I would say is the same, if not a bit smaller, than a Thirsties XS cover. It goes to 18lbs or approximately 9 months. Then you can get the Thirsties Duo, size 2, which should take you through potty training. These really save you $ because they are well priced to begin with, & you won't have to buy NEARLY as many covers. (unless you just can't resist all the beautiful colors it comes in!)



Maybe I'll snap some pictures of her in her Gro Baby's later today for some more updated pictures! :) I do want to say, I LOVE my Gro Baby's! While they aren't AS economical as prefolds and covers, I think in the long run they are pretty close...

:) Feel free to ask any questions! :)

Cloth Diapering (part one)

Lots of people had crazy reactions when I said I was going to cloth diaper (CD), mostly they thought i was crazy , that it is so much extra work at an already crazy time & that it is pretty gross to CD. Generally I'd say I'm a pretty lazy person, and i'm not finding it too much extra work! (I will say, today was an exhausting day and I was a tiny bit bummed that i had to to do CD laundry, but, since it isnt THAT hard to do, i survived! :))

On me and Cloth Diapering !

Since day 3 I used prefolds(PFs) (traditional rectangular diapers like our Mom's remember) and covers. These days they have covers that have velcro, instead of rubber pants. (Well, some people DO still use the rubber pants, but I'd rather use velcro! :)) I used PFs from Green Mountain Diapers. I also bought some from another company, but so far they are too small or too big. I use them as burp cloths and changing pad covers for now. But I can tell the quality is MUCH better from Green Mountain Diapers (GMD). GMD is a tad more expensive but they make PFs in sizes that are less bulky.

If I knew then what I knew now...

I would've ONLY bought PFs and covers!! This is the cheapest way to CD! And it really isn't very hard! I bought other diapers for night time because i thought in my sleep deprived state it would be too hard to use PFs at night, but it really isn't!

I will say that the Orange Edge PFs didn't last too long for us. C was a big baby, but actually, I found she outgrew them as far as absorbancy went, before actually outgrowing them size wise. I never had a leak though, so they were still absorbant enough, but just barely!

Because I wasn't sure how I'd feel about PFs, I was looking for a simple system that would *hopefully* last throughout diaper wearing days for more than one kid. A new diaper hit the market while I was planning my CD "stash" & it seemed to fit the bill. I ended up going with this system for my longterm use diapers. Diapers that are meant to last from newborn stage to toddlerhood are called "one size" (OS). Most OS diapers are NOT infact, one size, because they usually don't fit newborns. (which is why i had PFs and covers on hand). However, my ginormous baby (ok, not really. she was slightly bigger than average, at 8lbs 11oz) fit her OS diapers pretty much right away. I tried them on her at 6 days old & they were quite bulky, but fit. I'll post some pictures so you can see.

I'll go ahead and say here some advice that is good, but i kind of ignored. You really shouldn't invest in ONE system before your baby is born, b/c you just don't know what you will like. it's best to try out a diaper or two and THEN commit. I would've only gotten PFs and Covers if i had done that... but I wanted to have diapers ready to go when she came...plus, people got me some as gifts! :) But that's my tip to you, even though i didnt really follow it...

Anyway, the diaper I selected was the Gro Baby diaper. It is a OS diaper, but what i like about it is that the absorbant part snaps in & out, so if the diaper is wet only (or if poop didnt get on the cover), you can keep re-using the outer part. Exclusively breastfed newborns poop is quite runny, so it often gets on the cover, a complaint by some, but it doesn't really bother me. you could get away with a lot less shells though, (so cheaper) if you waited to start using these for an older baby who is eating solids. I figured in the long run, since i had already committed to this system, it was cheaper to just have a lot of shells. I also didn't want to have a lot of different diapers around- it would just confuse B!! (and i don't want to get addicted to diaper buying- that isn't gonna save money!! :)

As far as washing goes, I keep it simple. I use either country save or tiny bubbles (both cloth diaper safe and good for the enviroment). I do a hot wash with extra water (a setting on my HE washer) and an extra rinse. NO liquid softener in our washer (in any load, not just diapers) anymore! And no dryer sheets either. I use dryer balls and LOVE them.

my "pager" (aka C is crying) is going off, so i'm going to finish this for now. I'll try to make a post soon with pictures of C in her diapers. Also, if you post any questions in the comments, I'll do a follow up blog answering them! :)

Wordless Wednesday! (well not quite).

I know I know, I updated 2x in 2 days!!

This Wednesday is not quite wordless b/c I just wanted to say that I stole this idea from a friend of mine's blog: http://gatesfamblog.blogspot.com/ All future Wordless Wednesday's will actually be wordless. :)

One Month Old!!

eep! it's so hard to keep up with the blog these days. I also wish I had more time to read my buddies blogs. I've gotta fix up my google reader so I can read them on my iphone...

things are going really well. Of course, it all depends on when you ask me that question. Obviously, if I have time to write a blog, it's a good day, so I think things are going splendidly. :) C sleeps pretty well- even when i complain, i realize it could be a thousand times worse! She recently started giving me really long stretches at night, which has been awesome. She sleeps in her own room now (:tear:!) I miss her, but I'm much happier having my husband in my room. Maybe it's controversial, but I think our room is for US. And B couldn't sleep with her getting up in the night, so he was sleeping in the guest room. Well that lasted for four nights! I'm glad things are as they should be, though I really missed having her by the bed! And she looks so little in her crib!

We've had quite the slew of visitors! My Dad, Robin, My mom, B's parents, Shani, my bro and sis-in law, and various aunts and uncles & cousins and tomorrow Genelle! Phew! when Genelle leaves I'll really be on my own! GULP!! I've had a few alone days though, and they go okay. :)

We had a family reunion with my mom's side of the family this past weekend. it was SO fun! it is crazy how much my cousins kids have grown up. I can't believe next year how much different C will be!! I really love my family and I'm glad we got to see everyone and hang out! And C was SO good!! She made me look like such a good mom, LOL.

We've been cloth diapering since we came home from the hospital (so since she was 2 days old!) I really like doing it! I'll probably blog in detail about it sometime in the future, but I HIGHLY reccommend it. It really isn't much extra work at all-- It's actually fun for me to do diaper laundry! And i'm so glad to be doing something good for the environment. Plus, no poop explosions! I haven't had a diaper leak (other than user error when she was really little). And trust me, there's been some SERIOUS pooping goin on. (this is the only time in life i find it appropriate to blog about poop, LOL. and probably some of you think even now isn't a good time! hehe.)

Brian has been doing really well with her. :) It's so cute. I got tears in my eyes when we first came home from the hospital and he was holding her... i might get choked up again just thinking about it....

speaking of post partum hormones, i feel like i'm doing pretty well. Though I suppose you should ask Brian!! hehe! it has definitely been rough some days (usually it's in connection with rough nights!) , for the most part I feel like I'm feeling pretty good, emotionally and physically. My tailbone is still pretty sore though! :(

I seriously can't believe how much C has changed already. She can hold her head up for quite awhile (it's SO cute! she peers over my shoulder, just taking in the world.::dies:::) She really looks different too! (though everyone still says she looks like Brian!!)

I swear she smiled at me the other morning. I know it's too soon, and it was at 4am and I'm all sleep deprived. But I'm still going to think that she smiled at me. :)

I'm sure I could write about a thousand other things, but I'm afraid naptime is about to end! :)

More pics to come later! You can check out my web gallery here:

http://gallery.me.com/mrsgoose