Why I cloth diaper

I love cloth diapers.  I realize that there are those who believe that statement means that I am crazy.  I agree that CDing is not for everyone.  It is for me, for a lot of reasons.

1.  They're cute.  Really cute

I have diapers in about a dozen colors, including a cow print, and they come in dozens more.  You can get them personalized, you can get them embroidered, you can get them with monkeys or flowers or stripes.  They match her outfits and her dresses, so I never have to worry about diaper covers.  The diaper is always cuter than the cover.


2. Snaps.  Boo, like a lot of kids, loves to remove any article of clothing that she can remove. She started doing this when I was still using disposables, and it created some big messes and embarrassing moments.  Her cloth diapers all fasten with snaps, which make them toddler removal-proof


3. Diaper rash: Boo had horrible diaper rash all the time with disposables.  She still gets it, but not nearly as often

4. All that hippie/granola mom stuff:
     Landfills: a diaper takes roughly 500 years to decompose in a landfill.  It's nice to feel that I'm contributing less to that waste.  Dumping human waste in a landfill is illegal in all 50 states; this includes waste in diapers.  This means that every time we throw away a poopy disposable, we are actually breaking the law.  If you look at a diaper box, it says to shake the diaper into the toilet before throwing away.  I've never met anyone, including myself, who does this.  I do with cloth (and it's not nearly as gross as you think).
    My garbage can never gets full.  I don't even take it to the curb every week.  This is a nice change
    It takes a cup of crude oil to create a diaper.
    I like the feel of cloth.  The cotton and microfiber feel much better than plastic.  They're soft--cloth diapers are sometimes called fluff--and they don't contain the sodium polyacrylate and dioxin that are present in disposables.
    Most brands are made in the USA, often by WAHMs (work-at-home-moms), and are sweat-shop free.

5. Fewer trips to the store: this is where a lot of the money saving happens.  I used to go to Target at least once, usually twice a month on a diaper run.  I'd end up buying a bunch of stuff, some I needed, some I really didn't need.  I do this much less often now, and save at least forty dollars a month just because I don't put myself in a position to spend.  Add in the gas and wear and tear on the car, and it adds up.

6. The cost: if you only CD one child, and you don't use expensive brands of diapers, the savings aren't as great as the websites and some CD advocates want you to think.  I used to use Target brand diapers, at about 14 dollars a box.  I went through a little more than two boxes a month, at a cost of about 32 dollars.  Add wipes, and I spent about 44 dollars a month diapering my daughter.  In 15 months, this equals 660 dollars.

In the same 15 months, I have spent approximately 600 dollars CDing.  This includes the diapers, laundry detergent, slightly increased utility bills, wet bags, repairs to a few of the diapers, a clothesline to dry them on, and a few packages of disposables to use as backup. This isn't much less than I would have spent on disposables, but I shouldn't have to buy any more diapers--at all--until Ivy potty trains. Some of the purchases, like wet bags and the clothesline, are multifunctional and will be useful even when I'm done diapering..  I'll also make back some of my investment by selling the diapers when I'm done with them.

I made a few costly mistakes along the way; buying a laundry detergent that didn't work, spending over one hundred dollars on a brand of diapers that I really don't like and don't use unless I have to.  Were I having another child, the savings would be great because I already know what to do and what not to do. My final cost evaluation will come when Ivy potty trains.  For now, I'm satisfied that the diapers are saving enough money to be worth it.

7.  I like it, okay?  It's not for everyone, and that's fine.  Disposables are handy things, and I completely get why someone would use them exclusively.  I just choose not to.  I hope that anyone with a baby or having a baby will give just a moment's thought to the idea of cloth diapering.  Even if you don't choose it, at least consider it an option.