Although making the decision to cloth diaper was a no-brainer to me, I was still a little overwhelmed by just what that meant. In spite of the up-front cost of cloth vs. disposable, I wasn’t sure how it would all work. My mother and mother-in-law scared me with tales of how they “used to do it”. It all seems so time-consuming and messy. However, after a little research, a cloth diapering class, and a couple of weeks of trial and error, I came up with a method that worked for me. At first I liked the “all-in-one” (AIO) idea but quickly found out that it takes those diapers a long time to dry! Pocket diapers really never appealed to me because the inside and the wrap had to be separated to wash/dry so that left the other two options and I pretty much went with both; all-in-two (AI2) and pre-folds with a cover.

The AI2’s have a doubler (hemp/fleece) that snap in/out of the cover and I usually used them for “wet days” when I wasn’t expecting a BM, although I was surprised more than once! More often than not though I used pre-folds with covers and I since I had the AI2’s, I had quite a few covers that I could use. I found that with 18 regular sized organic cotton pre-folds and about half as many covers/AI2’s I could go every other day without washing and sometimes two days. It’s best to see what you like by buying a couple of each type in the infant size before you buy an entire set of “regular” size diapers. Keep in mind though that you will go through a lot of diaper changes in the first two months and the stools will change when you switch to solid foods!

Till tomorrow…live green!

~Jennifer

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