Baby got back

Today I want to talk a bit about cloth diapers. I've been thinking a lot lately about shopping and the excessive usage of plastic bags, and do want to talk about that, but I'll save that for the next post. Right now though I want to share a bit on how my husband and I choose to diaper our daughters.

I was cloth diapered as a baby, simply because that is what was done in those days. But now there are plenty of other options and most people don't even consider CD. When I was pregnant I did a bit of research, mostly (initially, at least) motivated by the fact that we were expecting twins and I was searching for a way to keep our expenses down. I discovered modern day cloth, and how different the diapers are today from how they were back when I was a kid. Now you don;t just have flats with pins and plastic pants; now there are prefolds with PUL covers, snappis, pockets, all-in-ones, fitteds, doublers, wool longsies, etc. It's a whole new world. It's a far more user-friendly world, that's for sure.

We settled on a stash of prefolds with covers and, mostly, pockets, of which BG 3.0 make up the bulk. We do use disposables at times, like when we're out and about. With two babies there's a limit to how many soiled cloth diapers I want to carry around town with me. Do I feel bad I don't CD all the time? Yes. But mostly I feel better about all the time I do CD, and the landfill space I am saving every time I reach for a brightly colored cloth diaper instead of a disposable.

There are other choices I make that are in line with my eco-friendly philosophies. I don't use Pampers or Huggies or other imported diaper brands and instead choose to use the local Tiltulim brand. They work just as well as any other diaper and are usually far cheaper than any other brand. It's the same reason why I don't use compostable diapers. They sound great, but aren't made locally, so the fuel used to ship all those diapers across the ocean isn't worth it to me.

Remember, every time you make a purchase, you are condoning now that item reached the supermarket shelf. Did it come on a truck from another factory? Was it manufactured in another country, trucked to an airport, flown cargo halfway across the world? Trucked to a storage facility, then trucked to the supermarket shelf?

Similarly, think about what happens when it leaves that shelf. Do you stick it in your car and drive it home? Do you walk it home? Do you take public transportation? Every single one of these choices has an impact, yet they are things most people never even consider.

We are fortunate enough to live a stones throw away from a supermarket, making our purchases very easy. But even when we lived further we still walked home, or would take public transportation home (while loaded with a granny cart and hiking backpack full of our purchases.) These decisions do have an impact. You do have the power to make a change with every single choice you make. Don't fall for colorful labeling, encouraging you to buy the imported item over the equal local one. Don't be afraid of spending an extra few minutes doing something slightly more complicated but that benefits the planet immensely (because really, CD does only take an extra two minutes a day, total. If even that. Certainly time saved from not having to schlep out all that diaper garbage every day!)

It's not for everyone, there is an ick factor. But what parent hasn't been spit up on, peed on, and pooped on already? It actually is possible to do this without dirtying your hands one bit. Plus, they're so darn cute!!

Edit: my mother corrected me, "we when [sic] had you, some people used cloth diapers, but not many. We were pretty counter culture in what we did then."