A dabble in cloth diapers

I have been considering using cloth diapers with Gabriel. In fact, I considered it with Tommy & Elliott, too, but it just didn't seem worth it since I knew cloth + daycare would not be a good fit. I hemmed and hawed and decided not to decide because in the research I'd done, I concluded it would be best to NOT attempt to start cloth right away. Blessedly, some very wise friends and family members bought us plenty of teeny tiny diapers so we've actually yet to spend any money on bum covers thus far.

My mom knew I was thinking of trying it and when my sister Heidi asked her what kind of baby gift she should give us, Mom suggested some cloth diapers. This is SO great for many reasons, not the least of which is part of what had me paralyzed on the subject is that there are a ginormous number of choices when it comes to what type of diaper system to use. Check out this website and you'll see what I mean: all-in-ones, pocket, fitted, hybrid, prefold, Unitarian, Manchurian... (Okay, maybe I made some of those up...) I am thrilled that she was The Decider!

Heidi sent me gDiapers. They are SO cute and soft and just looking at them makes me feel like a better person. (Well, pretty much all the modern day cloth diapers are totally-never-want-my-baby-to-wear-pants-and-cover-them-up ADORABLE and would do those other things, too.) The gDiapers are a hybrid because they come with an outer cotton shell, a snap-in plastic liner, and with cloth OR disposable liners to catch the poo/pee. Heidi sent me the cloth (made of cotton and hemp) liners. The disposable ones can be flushed, composted or thrown away. (They are 100% biodegradable). In addition, they have the added "awww" factor of being called gDiapers which suits Master Gabriel Giessler quite nicely.

Today I gave them a whirl and it went pretty well. Here it is in pictures.

This is the back of the diaper. How yummy is this?

The plastic liner snapped in and an extra cotton/hemp liner.

He's in! It's a testament to how easy these are to manage because Mr. G was really hungry when I put this first diaper on him and was MAD MAD MAD that I was changing him before chow time. It literally took me no longer than a disposable to do this.

After a snack and ready for an outing. Yes! I went OUT with a cloth diaper on him and even managed to change him into ANOTHER cloth diaper on the road. We rocked it!

I will definitely use these diapers and invest in more liners and shells to expand my usage. It is FAR from cheap to get all the goods you need to get started (again, THANK YOU, AUNT HEIDI!) but I have a huge box of unopened "size 1" Pampers (thank you Aunt Jen & Uncle Todd!) so I'm not worried about running out of diapers in the mean time! I also think that at least for now I will keep him in disposables overnight.... the cloth do get pretty soaked in just a couple of hours.

Slow and steady I will add to my stash... and to my supply of the myriad super fun accessories you buy to help make cloth diapering more manageable.