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Thursday, February 19, 2009

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An update from our second winner!

Do you remember Carrie? She was our winner from week 2, and she is now sharing with us her cloth diapering experience, and shares about the Wahmies One Size Diaper with FREE One Size Insert AND a Planet Wise Wet Bag that she won:

PhotobucketMy cloth diaper journey began about two years ago. My son was several months old and I was just becoming more aware of my personal impact on our environment. The waste my little household produced was becoming a burden in my mind and I didn't know what to do about my newfound problem. While shopping in one of my favorite discount stores at the time, I came upon a box of gdiapers. I loved the idea of a flushable liner and bought the starter kit in the size appropriate for my son. With only two covers, I didn't get a chance to use these for each diaper change during the day. But every time I saved one diaper from the landfill, I felt a twinge of glee. My son grew, my family moved to another state, and I became pregnant. Disposable diapers were simply our standard.

One June day last summer, I simply decided that I could not keep mindlessly contributing diaper waste to our landfill and throwing hard-earned money down the drain. I feverishly googled anything and everything about cloth diapers and I was utterly overwhelmed by the range of products and prices out there. Who knew?! After initially getting discouraged and not even knowing how or where to begin, I gave myself a pep talk (since I don't personally know anyone else who cloth diapers her children) and decided to take one step at a time.

PhotobucketI learned about a one-size diaper option and figured that could be a good place to begin. BumGenius 3.0 diapers seemed to get consistently positive reviews so that's how I began cloth diapering my son. The price per diaper, $17.95 also seemed overwhelming to me since one diaper doesn't last more than a couple hours on any child. I decided to go ahead with the purchase anyway. If I was unhappy and decided not to continue, I reasoned that I would re-sell the diapers. A couple days later, my 3 diapers arrived and I experienced the thrill of my first fluffy mail. I gave the three diapers a wash and Dylan (my son) wore them the next day. That was the day I became hooked. For the next several weeks, I found myself washing the three diapers every night and putting them on Dylan during the day. I felt such disappointment each time he went through his first three diapers of the day and had to finish with disposables. I decided that with each new paycheck, we could get another one or two diapers. The snail's pace of building my stash was discouraging, but at least the process was moving forward.

July brought three more bG 3.0 diapers. Also during July, I began figuring out what my new baby would wear on his bottom. His first diapers included Kissaluvs fitteds, prefolds, Bummis covers, and a couple small Fuzzi Bunz. During the summer and early fall months, I continued to buy diapers a little bit at a time. I gravitated toward one-size diapers but also mixed some sized pockets in as well. Wouldn't you know, the item I won in week 2 of Fluff Fridays Giveaways was a Wahmies One Size Diaper with FREE One Size Insert AND a Planet Wise Wet Bag!! I was thrilled!

The Wahmies One Size Diaper is perfect for little hands that love to take off a velcro diaper. The hooks that fit the diaper to my sons work to give a wonderful fit. My oldest son is long and lean and my baby is chunky so their body types are extremely different and this diaper works well on both. For those of you with big hands, though, beware the insert stuffing! My hands are on the larger size as far as women’s hands go, and the small opening makes this diaper a pain to stuff…otherwise it would probably be my favorite one size with its soft lining and fabulous functioning.
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Fast forward to today! It's hard to believe it's February and that I've been cloth diapering for eight months! I've built an adequate stash for my boys. I've also learned some things about myself and about cloth diapering along the way. Some of these lessons include...

* I love the smell of fresh diapers.
* I don't care for prefolds.
* There's really nothing cuter than a little boy (or girl, I will assume!) with a cloth bubble butt.
* I would have given up along the way if it weren't for flushable liners.
* Just because I have boys doesn't mean I can't enjoy girly wetbags.
* There is such thing as diaper envy and if I'm not careful, I am sucked in.
* My little family can make a difference in our world.

- By Carrie G.

32 comments:

A Psych Mommy said...

I agree with the girlie wet bags! I have a son and although I try to get him more gender neutral or "boy" prints for his diapers, the wet bags are for me! Your son is a cutie!

Chic Mama said...

So fun to hear about her experience- it is very similar to mine and many other mothers I am sure! Good for you mama!

melissad.williams said...

What a cute little pumpkin! And that Wahmies looks like a great diaper! I would love to try one of those!

Kelly Hutcheson said...

I agree with the liner comment!! Can't live without them! How do you all wash your diapers? Having bad luck in that area!

Maggie said...

What an encouraging story. It is so helpful to me to hear these stories. Thank you.

Amanda said...

Thank you for the encouragement. I started with my first 7 diapers one week ago (even though we just had our 4th child). Six are Blueberry one-size diapers and the other one is a small Fuzzi Bunz. I am washing each day and using up my disposables on hand while the cloth are in the wash. At first the cloth diapers seemed huge on my little 4 week old, but either she is growing or else I'm growing to enjoy the bubble bottom as well (probably a little of both!). I plan to make my next order of cloth before I run out of the disposables I already have and hopefully will not have to buy anymore disposables!!!

the monkeys' mama said...

I was a little afraid that those diapers would be harder to use but after reading this post it seems like not only are they easy but they also stay on despite prying baby hands! Thanks for the update!

Anonymous said...

It's neat how her story is similar to mine...I too started with only 3 diapers and fell in love with cloth!

Anonymous said...

Flushable liners are a vital part of my diaper regimen!!! I love Imse Vimse brand but I've read that others prefer the Bummus Biosoft flushies....I make sure and use those liners on every diaper!!

TheClothDiaperWhisperer said...

Thank you so much for sharing! Beautiful pictures!

EdenSky said...

I built up my stash the same way. adorable pictures and that whammies diaper looks like a great fit.

Sara in Seattle said...

So glad to hear from other cloth diapers! Thank you for sharing your experience!

Montana Mama said...

I've been trying to convince myself that I "need" a girly wetbag too. :) Maybe next paycheck!!! :)

Minnie said...

Great story! Your son is a lil' baby doll. Now I also want to try a WAHMIES diaper. I need to join a CDA group...Cloth Diaperaholic Anonymous group. Haha

Angela Sundara... etc said...

Oh, that was such a fun read! And the pictures are beautiful! And you're right- there's just something so fun about a cloth diaper bubble butt.

Dani said...

Your son is beautiful! I may have to buy myself a girly wetbag now - boy prints just aren't as cute!

erinsmomma said...

I've noticed a trend when it comes to cloth diapering stories. Many of them start out the same way, with moms who never knew that there were SO many choices for cloth diapers. It's really a world that you have no clue about until you start doing the research. Thanks for sharing!

Jenn said...

i agree with the list at the end ;) i should get some girly wetbags tho haha .. i do love my rocket rascals!!

Kelly said...

Carrie - What a great story! I love your lessons too. I too don't think I would of made it through without flushable linears except for now that I have a diaper sprayer and can't believe I lived without it with son #1.

Kelly - about washing diapers, check out an older post called "What's that Smell?". That post along with others that week and especially all the comments really gave me some new ideas on washing. Hope that helps.

AScott said...

I've never tried one with hooks, I'm a little scared to!

I also started out with three diapers a couple months ago, I am pretty new to this! Luckily though I got the Softbums all-in-two's so I can reuse the shells with snap ins!

I'm just now starting to try out different kinds of diapers since finding this blog as well.

Meghan said...

Thanks for sharing, Carrie! Your story is much like mine except I haven't yet reached the point of not using disposables while my few cloth are in the wash! I too get disappointed when the cloth are used up.

Serena Michelle said...

Carrie - I LOVE your post!

I know the upfront cost can be overwhelming for most folks, so this post is a wonderful example of how to build a cloth diaper stash on a monthly budget; a couple diapers at a time.

Honestly, this is the wisest way to do it - as I initially bought sooooo many of one diaper and then discovered there were other diapers I liked much more!

I picked up a couple Wahmies from Kelly's Closet in the exclusive sunset orange (same as the one pictures on your little one) and they're pretty nice! I like how the hook closure is so unique - and definitely toddlerproof! I posted a personal review of them on my personal blog - Diapering Dooty: http://diaperingdooty.blogspot.com/2009/02/wahmies-one-size-diapers-whook-closures.html

I know many of you wonderful mamas have mentioned "diaper envy" and I just never really imagined people could be envious of cloth diapers - but that just goes to show that cloth diapers really are AWESOME!

Kelly - As for washing diapers there are a NUMBER of recommendations out there - however what I found works best for most people regardless of the type of machine you use - a cold wash followed by a hot wash (additional rinse may or may not be necessary depending on which detergent you use) works well!

Katie said...

I agree!! There is nothing cuter than a bubble butt from a cloth diaper!

Plus, I have all boys and love girly wet bags too!

Liz said...

Thanks for sharing your journey with cloth diapers. I too, had no clue how many diaper options were out there until I started doing the research. I also did not know anyone who CD (except for one of my high school friends on FB). Even though I have all girls, I totally agree with having a girly wetbag/diaper bag!

Christina said...

thanks for the tip on flushable liners. We're still EBF but for the future!

Knit Wit said...

Thank you Carrie for sharing your story.

gibsonfam said...

Thank you so much for the wonderful comments. I will also add to my list at the end that ebf dirty dipes are so well contained with cloth. I have never had a blow out since using them!

Also, the hooks on the WAHM diaper take a little practice, but I do think it's an ingenius design once you get the hang of it. It's truly the best fitting one size I own.

K said...

I only recently started using cloth on a part-time basis with my toddler. I am slowly making the transition to cloth - testing out different combos/makes/models of cloth to find what will work for us. I was SO glad to find flushable liners a few weeks ago! They make using cloth with a toddler SO much easier! I have a newborn now (10 days old today) and am going to try to go with cloth for her too - still finding what works for our family before I stock up on any one type of diaper! :)

Sara said...

Thanks for sharing. I love hearing diapering stories. Thanks for the info!

Jess said...

Wow I could have wrote your post almost to a T! I started 8 months ago with 2 lil guys & love my BGs & girly wetbags ;) now I HAVE to try Whamies diaps!

one_lucky_mom said...

What an awesome story, I was nervous when I first started, but quickly found the cloth diaper love as well!

Andrea said...

I've noticed that my stash keeps growing too by a few diapers at a time as I realize how much better I like them-- I wash all my diapers every night. I really didn't think that cloth diapers would be something that I actually prefer to disposables; I started for cost, environment, and health reasons, and now I just think they're cute!