A Mama’s Guilty Pleasure: Cloth Diaper Organization

I should begin this post by mentioning organizing anything gets me excited. Every September (more like June) when school supplies are stocked, I flock to the crayon aisle just to hold that brand new box of Crayolas. And don’t get me started on binders and dividers...they are like the Gucci of office supplies.

Every devoted cloth diapering mom, whether she will admit it or not, gets a little giddy looking at pictures of diaper stashes. Pictures of diaper organization are no different. I’ve seen everything from elaborate changing tables with color-coded bins to diapers stored in laundry baskets. All you need is diapers and a little creativity.

An important factor to keep in mind when organizing any stash, especially one with multiple systems, is to make it easy for anyone to follow. Modern cloth diapering has come a long way from plastic pants and pins, but in exchange, the complexity of cloth diapering has increased dramatically. Keeping like items together will make any system easy to follow.

Because our nursery is a bit small, we opted against a changing table and bought a large dresser off craigslist. The top of the dresser was the perfect size for a changing pad, wipe warmer and basket of various baby toiletries. The first row of drawers was devoted completely to diapers, with the second and third row for clothes. I already had several clear plastic bins from Target that I was using elsewhere in the house. Amazingly, diapers stack in them perfectly!

Our stash is rather simple, as I prefer pockets and AIOs. If you have a variety of systems, trying to keep different diaper types separated will keep your well-intentioned friend/family member from getting lost in a sea of snappies and covers.

Our drawers look something like this:
Drawer 1: Disposable wipes and diapers, non-cloth diaper safe creams
Drawer 2: Newborn AIOs and OS pockets, CJs
Drawer 3: More pockets, cloth wipes, extra inserts and elastics

All the way on the left we have a plastic garbage can with a pail liner to hold all the dirties. On the far right is a laundry basket for clothes and next to that, a small trash can for disposable wipes or diapers. Although we don’t use disposables very often, we learned quickly that making an extra trip into the kitchen to throw away a dirty diaper, while holding a hungry baby, wasn’t very logical.

When I change a diaper, I start by putting the dirty diaper in the pail (unless its poopy, more to come on that in a minute). I then take a dry cloth wipe out of the drawer, dip in in the wipe solution in the warmer (so much easier than pre-moistening your cloth wipes) and wipe her bum. I grab a clean diaper from the drawer and after it’s on the baby, I grab a quick squirt of hand sanitizer and I’m out the door!

At this time, if the dirty diaper in question is a poopy diaper, I will take it to the bathroom and spray as much off as possible with the diaper sprayer. I wring the diaper out over the toilet, put it in the sink while I wipe down the toilet rim with some toilet paper and flush. I will then take the dirty diaper to the nursery and toss it in the pail only to return to the bathroom to wash my hands and wipe down the sink. This may be a lot of work for ebf poo that is water soluble but it keeps my diapers stain free and it keeps the husband from thinking there is poop floating around in our washer.

And that is the system that works for us. I hope this gives some of you ideas for organizing your own cloth diaper stash.

By Lindsay