Our Cloth Diaper Adventures

As I have mentioned the McCabes will be defeating many adventures this year. This will be a huge year of change for our family but Rob and I are both very ready for everything coming at us. I will start with our cloth diaper adventure! Who would have thought I would cloth diaper. If you know me, you know, that I HATE with a passion changing poopy diapers. Poor Rob, he had become the "official" poopy diaper changer when he was home, and I love that he has taken it on so willingly. :)

Well, when money gets tight and I start crunching numbers I realize that I don't have much of a choice but that I need to get use to the poop. So, I am in Florida, and I call my hubby and give him the figures and the core of cloth diapering. He agrees (like always)... here are some facts to share with you :

Lets just look at Jackson for now. We switched him over at 23 months but in a size 5 diaper those cost approx 0.40/per diaper at $2.77 per day! Just diapers. So if he is in diapers for the next 6 months (lets hope no longer than that) just his diapers for the next 6 months will cost our family close to $500.00! So, those numbers alone were enough for us to see that we needed to take this step.

So, here I am researching and eating, sleeping, dreaming, reading about cloth diapers for days. I realize pretty quickly that I can make them for cheaper :) So, what do I do... head out and start researching materials and fabrics and calling on my buddy Ash to help me along the way. So far I have spent $200 for Jackson's ENTIRE stash and some of the baby's stash. And can I tell you I have SOOO much fabric left that I will be able to make many more diapers. So, just say that $200 was only for Jackson I have already saved our family $300 on diapers for the next 6 months. Not counting that baby will be able to wear these diapers also from 12 months on. Which, since I am on a number kick, is $1,400 savings from 12-30 months old.

Here is Jackson stash of diapers. For the most part I am finished making his diapers unless I find something that is a must have. Right now I do a small load of laundry every three days. So, I am not adding much more when it comes to washing clothes.

These three lower diapers are for baby. I have no idea how big to make them so I am just playing around with a few different sizes and types. I don't want to make all one size and have them not work or fit her. So the above one is a fleece cover that will just go over a prefold diaper. This is supposed to be very newborn. The crab diaper is in between a small and medium. I am hoping it will fit her by two months and should fit for a while. I have added snaps so the sizing is versatile. Then the skirt is a diaper cover that is just too darn cute! I made this one hopefully big enough for her to fit in by spring :)

So, when you are wondering what in the world I am doing cloth diapering my kiddos, this is the number one reason! I am not hating it, I am actually really enjoying this journey.

Jackson LOVES them! I have tried to put plastic diapers on him for night time and he yanks and yells, so he is now wearing cloth diapers all the time (except for the times he is running around here nude and peeing outside :)

Last part of this cloth journey, are the wipes. I know I know.... cloth wipes too! Yes. This is kind of out of my laziness :) I didn't want to have to throw wipes in a trash can and have a separate place for diapers and wipes. I also didn't want to have to dig through the diaper bin to make sure there were no wipes, solution... cloth wipes! I made all these with recycled flannel receiving blankets and terry towels. I have yet to make the solution yet for the wipes but it is as simple as water, baby soap, and tea tree oil.

So, there you have it! One of our many journeys that we will be adventuring through!