Cloth Diapering (continued)

So a few weeks ago I posted about cloth diapering. And I said that I would update you on how it's going... so here it is:

The first couple of days were hard. Elisa had diarrhea, there was a lot of poop that leaked onto the diaper covers, it took a long time to get the diapers on, the diapers were super bulky, most of her pants didn't seem to fit over the top of the diapers.... and everything just seemed a lot harder. Also, I had no cloth diaper bin, so I was just sticking the diapers into the washing machine... which meant that if I wanted to do other laundry I had to take them out... ick!

On the instructions that came with the diapers it said that it was hard to transition from disposable to cloth... and not to give up right away. So, we didn't. We bought a trash can for the dirty diapers and just kept on trying.

It's been about a month now, and we've been using them about half the time. For awhile I had a goal of using four a day... and that kept me motivated. But now I use them most of the time when I'm home. And it's really not that hard. Greg agrees... he wasn't really into the idea from the beginning. But now he uses them too and it's no big deal. In fact, I think we're going to buy a few more so that we have enough to use them even on "washing days." We both agree that we don't like using them when we're away from home. So I think we'll just stick to using them when we're here.

They are really quite easy to wash. I use diaper liners (which are thin sheets of paper-like stuff that go in between the diaper and the baby's butt), so I can just flush the liner with the poop. I rarely have to dunk the diapers in the toilet, or deal with poop. Then on wash day I just dump them in the washer and run them through once on cold, then once on hot. I wash the liners that were just peed on along with the diapers and reuse them. I don't fold my diapers (folding has long been my least favorite thing about laundry). I just stack them and use them again... so that's easy peasy!

I think that the hardest things for me to get used to are:
1) The added bulk. I have pants that Elisa can wear with cloth diapers and pants that she can wear with disposables. If I switch halfway through the day I have to switch pants too... otherwise the pants will either fall off, or be so tight that Elisa has trouble moving.
2) The added diapering time. Even though I've gotten faster it still takes about three times as long for me to change a cloth diaper. And Elisa is NOT a patient diaper changer. She wants to be moving and crawling and rolling, not laying on her back getting her diaper changed.

But other than that... I guess I like it. It is a little more work. But overall I'm glad that I'm saving money. Though I'm still not so sure that I'm saving the earth.