A New Frontier

We are about to venture into a new arena with baby #3. Cloth diapers.

Let me start by saying I feel very uneducated on the subject. When I started looking into this, I had no idea where to even start. My limited knowledge of CDing (cloth diapering) mostly consists of memories from the early 80's of towel-like rags and stretched out rubber covers. But, as we are only 4 weeks away (one month from TODAY!) from baby's arrival and my two older kids have been out of diapers for almost a full year, I cringe every time I go down the baby aisle and eye the price tags on those tiny diapers we will be buying again for the next 3 years or so. In fact, I sat down and added it up and it was in the thousands...each year! In researching the options that are out there now...well let's just say cloth diapering is at a whole, new level!

We aren't going exclusively cloth, in fact we plan on still using disposables quite a bit, especially at first. We know that there are going to be a lot of times when disposable is going to be easier, or even necessary, and we are totally okay with that. But, if using cloth diapers while at home or whenever we can will help cut the costs, we are willing to give it a try. Plus, when I found out you can get disposable diaper liners to help make messy clean-ups easier, I felt a lot better about trying it. That is much less intimidating to me as a beginner.

There are SO many options out there it can be overwhelming. But, we have narrowed it to the bumGenius 3.0 One Size (all the CD brand names are so funny!) that will work best for us and got great reviews. These diapers are made by Cotton Babies, which seems to be a well-esteemed company in the cloth diapering world.

These diapers adjust to 4 different sizes so they grow with the baby which was a big seller to us as well, plus (surprisingly) they are supposed to have a great resale value. I guess if someone else is willing to buy our used diapers I am more than willing to let them :).

Sadly, I decided we would return the Beco Carrier I purchased earlier, and use the credit towards getting started with these diapers. I think this will be a wiser use of our money in the long run, especially since I found a Mei Tai carrier that I LOVE on eBay for only $20. After trying both carriers (as much as I loved the Beco), I am sure I will be using the Mei Tai way more since it fits me so much better.

We are starting out with 6 diapers and will see how it goes. If it seems manageable, we will look into purchasing some more so we can really use them without doing laundry 3 times a day. So, as we start this new adventure I'm sure I will keep track of how it is going! Any CD users out there, feel free to share your advice with this CD newbie! :)