Yeah it is... and he is! but I totally do not get baby clothes sizes and get really confused at the store.
I thought when you buy a 12 months outfit it is suppose to fit a kid around 12 months. I'm not asking for exactness... but at least a semi-accurate range. When I go to the 3-6 months baby clothing section I expect to find at least one thing that will fit my almost five month old.
Before John was born I thought I had a gold mine of clothes (thank you, everyone, for the gifts... sorry my kid is a growing machine and only wore your outfit once or twice) and that I wouldn't have to shop for at least a year! Boy was I wrong.
My current favorite store is called "Once Upon A Child." They have good stuff... most things I've found were close to new, and priced decently (better than Kohl's, at least... which is another store I'm addicted to). Around John's three month birthday I started to notice that we were running low on clothes that would fit... he was already in 9 month outfits according to how "they" size them. And we needed sleepers because he was done with swaddling.
Currently he is in 9-12 month clothes, but we are beginning to start pulling out the 9-month outfits for storage until a little brother comes along (his little sister will be wearing bows and dresses and John doesn't own any of those). We have a good amount of outfits for now so I'm trying to convince him to maintain his current size... but every time I look at him I think he has grown.
The only outfits that aren't in danger of storage for the future are an 18 month onesie and a few pairs of overalls that I think will fit him around Christmas.
Now, I'm not complaining... it's kinda fun to shop for John. He's so cute and I definitely like the bigger boy clothes better than little onesies. I'm just asking for a little help navigating the store.
A friend of mine was watching John while I ran some errands. I went to Once Upon A Child for a Fall-ish outfit. I didn't have him with me so I just held up things to get a feel for what I thought might fit. I picked out some dark blue jeans and a button up shirt (like Dad has).
After I got them home and washed, I noticed that the top said 6-12 months. Understandable... John wears 12 months clothes now, and I was shopping in the 12 month section. But the pants said newborn!
Newborn? Really. I mean, he's wearing a cloth diaper under those blue jeans and they don't look snug at all.
I guess I just want some consistency.
Oh, well. I'll be done ranting now...
Let's just look at pictures of my cute kid!
I think overall, John was just excited to see how his new outfit tasted...
I don't plan on selling one specific thing... mostly crafts I've made and used and that just plain work really, really well. I'm not promising that any of my ideas are totally original, but I am promising that they work!
Currently I have a faux cami, baby bibs & baby beanies for sale. I hope to get more faux camis up soon... they work so great and keep you cool... and they don't sag down like normal camisoles do. I'm planning on putting up some homemade diapers and wool diaper covers in the next month or so. And I have many, many, many, (too many) plans for future inventory.
My sister-in-law took the picture on the left this past weekend. It reminded of how I so carefully put together our sock monkey friend in hopes to take pictures of John each month with it. Well, I guess I fell off the wagon around the month 1 mark because I didn't make it past his newborn picture. I think it had something to do with the "tiny" nursing crisis we were having in our household at that time (I say tiny because it totally wasn't... I was really torn/sad/discouraged/upset/confused/mad/frustrated/annoyed that nursing wasn't working for us... despite my efforts... and tears... but I was going crazy... and that is another post).
Anyway! I'm kinda glad I missed some months of pictures with our sock monkey friend, because now the difference is quite dramatic! I must say, they look completely different... but I promise it is totally the same kid. He is four months in this picture, so if I take one at eight months & one year then we will have a series, right? Well... I may do it, I may not... but for now I'm just in shock over this picture.
I’ve been working on this post for probably a month. It is really, really, really long so prepare yourself. Hopefully you will enjoy learning about how I do cloth diapers and maybe gain some ideas for your system of cloth diapers... or maybe you will just think I'm crazy... cuz I kinda am... but this crazy women is saving TONS of money!!!
Anyway...
I LOVE, love, LOVE our cloth diapers! I really thought it would be hard to overcome the convenience of disposable diapers. But I’ve gotten used to the extra laundry and it’s really not as much as of a hassle as I thought it would be. I can honestly say I enjoy using cloth more than disposables. Cloth diapers work! And they save money! (and they are soft & pretty) If they didn’t work I would be using disposables… but since I don’t have leaks and I never really touch dirty diapers after they come off of John, I don’t mind using cloth at all.
John has been in cloth since he was 2.5 weeks old. However, we didn’t start using them while out of the house until John was three months old. I lacked the supplies to do diaper changes while away from home, so I kept a small stash of disposables around. It was kind of a pain to do both cloth and disposables… I would have to remember to switch him out of cloth before our trips out of the house. Now that we are fully equipped, I feel comfortable using cloth everywhere from bible study to trips over night at Grandma’s house.
We started with the simplest system, prefolds and covers, and our stash evolved from there. However, we didn’t deviate too much. We still use prefolds and covers, but we have added homemade fitted diapers and pocket diapers… and a few diapers which don’t really fit those categories, our Flip diapers.
Okay, so that you will understand what I’m talking about when I say “prefold” or “Flip diaper” I’m going to try to explain all parts of our system.
Covers
Cloth diapers have two parts. The part that absorbs water (I’m going to call it the diaper) and the part that keeps your baby’s clothes dry (the cover). We started with PUL (polyurethane laminate) covers because they aren’t too expensive and are widely used. We have added in wool covers because I can make them! (I probably wouldn’t use wool covers if I couldn’t make them… they are really really expensive!)
The great thing about the cover & diaper system is that you can use the covers more than once without washing them if they aren’t soiled. I usually keep two out during the day and rotate between the two. I wash them when they get soiled or about every three days whenever I’m loading up the washing machine.
I love my one sized covers! All of my covers except for some of the wool covers are one sized. I LOVE the idea of one sized covers. You buy it once and it fits your kiddo from 8-35 pounds! So smart and cost effective!
I really like snaps on the covers (as opposed to Velcro) because it makes washing a lot simpler. Velcro can stick to different things in the wash and it is kinda annoying. Snaps eliminate that and it’s nice. But they say with Velcro you get a “better” fit… although I’ve had no fitting problems with John so far. Snaps are also supposes to last longer but I’ll have to get back to you on that… so far so good.
When I made my one sized wool cover I used Velcro simply because it was cheaper. I also experimented with buttons on wool covers. I like the buttons a lot more, but I’m not going to go back and change my Velcro one because it works fine.
Wool covers are pretty amazing (but once again, if I couldn’t make them for as cheap as I do then I wouldn’t use them). Wool is very breathable, yet it becomes surprisingly water resistant when lanolized. It is also antibacterial and super cute on little babies.
When I first started using wool I made a one sized green cover. It was a great cover. But, I thought I had lanolized it incorrectly because his diaper would feel moist. I thought it was the wool (because it came from an old skirt) and tossed the diaper cover and the rest of the skirt material.
I now totally regret that. After I started using the covers that I knitted and crocheted I realized that they do get a little moist but you can have a soaked diaper under them and they won’t get your baby’s clothes wet. It actually is kinda nice because it helps you know when your baby is completely soaked. I’m really mad at myself for throwing away the wool so quickly, but we do have 3 working covers that I made out of one skein of Fisherman’s Wool (plus our maroon one I made from a skein of fancy wool from Lonestar). I probably only need 4 or 5 covers… but I will most likely continue making them because I really enjoy making them.
I still haven’t perfected wool covers while we are out, but I have many options so I’m not stressing about it… we mainly use wool when we are home. I love the idea of doing cloth for next to nothing as far as cost is concerned and the MOST cost effective way for covers is to get your knitting/crocheting needles out with a good ball of wool. I also love knowing that if John outgrows our current set of diapers (that are supposed to be one sized) I can make him a bigger set.
Prefolds (diaper)
We started with a ton of these because we borrowed some from a friend, but we are now back down to the 10 I recieved as gifts while pregnant. They couldn’t be simpler… it’s a rectangle that you fold around your baby. It is the traditional cloth diaper and it works well.
Fastening with a Snappi is optional, but I really like Snappies. John is a WIGGLE WORM! I have found that the prefold stays in place much better during his play time if I fasten it with a Snappi. And, with a little boy I’ve gotten soaked a couple of time during changes. A Snappi keeps the diaper in place (containing any sprays) while I’m trying to get the cover on.
We asked for Econobums because they were the most inexpensive way to diaper your baby (and because Cotton Babies makes them). The starter pack ($50) comes with 12 prefolds and 3 covers AND now 1 wet bag (I totally missed out on the wet bag when we got ours… so jealous). I highly, Highly, HIGHLY, HIGHLY recommend Econobums. They are inexpensive because they only come in white and because they have a one sized PUL cover with a prefold (a one sized cover and a prefold is the cheapest way you could go even if you opted out of buying Econobums… but unless someone gives you diapers Econobums is the least inexpensive way I’ve seen cloth diapers done).
The Flip system (also made by Cotton Babies) is essentially the same thing, however, they are more expensive because the covers come in different colors and have some extra features to help hold the insert in place. In addition the inserts (instead of prefolds) have fancy microfiber, which can hold a crazy amount of fluid, and the inserts have “stay dry” liners which helps out a TON with diaper rash.
Econobums aren’t fancy, but they work… and you can literally diaper your baby from newborn to potty training for $150! That is so great! In the beginning they fit John’s skinny legs really well… and they still do now that he has chucker thighs. So far the covers haven’t shown any sign of wear and tear and my Econobums get a lot of use because I tend to grab them a lot (in most of John’s pictures he is in Econobum Covers).
I’ve talked about how much I love Cotton Babies (mainly because of their diaper grants for missionaries) in the past and this is just another GREAT Cotton Babies product. When it comes to purchasing new cloth diapering supplies it is really hard for me to purchase anything from anyone else besides Cotton Babies (and no, they didn’t pay me to say that… although, I wish they would!). I only really buy things outside of Cotton Babies when I have swagbucks to spend. And now that swagbucks added PayPal cash to its list of gift cards I may start saving up for those instead of Amazon gift cards.
Flip Insert (another type of diaper)
I’m not going to spend too much time on our Flip diapers. You can go to the website and read more. However, I will say I’m a fan of Flips if you can kinda predict when your baby is going to poop. The inserts have no elastic so they can’t contain messes… thus ruining your cover until laundry day. John is pretty predictable so I still use the two flip insert we have. I like to use them when we are out because they are less bulky and they absorb a crazy amount of fluid!
In my quest to find even cheaper diapering options I stumbled into the homemade diaper realm. And I have to say it’s quite satisfying to make something so functional out of things you were going to discard (old sheets, t-shirts, socks with holes, etc). I love my (16) fitted diapers because they are so simple to put on (no folding) and the elastic around the legs holds in messes better than prefolds, saving my covers for another use before laundry day. They also tend to be less bulky… but not quite as trim as the Flip diapers.
There is a disadvantage with pockets diapers because the cover part of them can’t be reused like a PUL or a Wool cover can be. I initially thought I wouldn’t use them. But I had one and I really really liked it when we started struggling with diaper rash. I received 5 additional pockets as an AMAZING gift and I was hooked! My current count is up to 8 and I use them all! I’m currently saving swagbucks like crazy to buy more and requesting them for all Christmas and Birthday presents for John for the next three years!... and for all our other kids :)
I don’t mind stuffing them and they are so great for babysitters and long road trips. If we weren’t so concerned about money (they cost about $15-$20 each… and you need 36 diaper for a set) I might have opted to use all pockets (or Bumgenius to be more specific)… which I thought I would never say… but it turns out I really really like them!
(not pictured below is my yellow Bumgenius and a orange Fuzzi Bunz)
This usually tends to confuse people the most. I get the craziest looks when I pull out my wipes (especially since they are dark green and plaid). Cloth wipes can go straight into the pail with the diapers and it saves me the step of sorting disposable wipes from cloth diapers. Plus, we use a lot wipes (on his bum, face and/or hands) so it definitely saves us money. After I wash diapers I sort out the wipes and continue re-using them.
You can purchase cloth wipes, but I opted to cut up an old flannel sheet we had. I didn’t see the point in spending money on flannel wipes when I had a flannel sheet that Steven wanted to get rid of. One half of a fitted sheet made WAY more than the enough wipes.
I do spend some time folding the wipes because I want them to pop up out of the box just like the ones you buy at the store. It does take time, but it’s so nice to not have to fight with a chain of wipes when you are trying to hold wiggly little legs and clean a messy bottom!
For a wipe solution I use baby wash and water. Once again, you can purchase special wipe solution, but we already have baby wash for baths so I use it. You can even add some oils or aloe vera to the solution to make it more moisturizing. To keep things simple I use only baby wash and water most of the time. I’ve experimented with different moisturizing agents in our quest to fight diaper rash, but it didn’t really make a difference.
You can add the solution to the wipe container to make pre-moistened wipes or you can use a dry wipe and a spray bottle of solution. We have done it both ways and I definitely like the pre-moistened wipes for changes at home. On the go I use a spray bottle because the wipes might mildew due to lack of use.
Cleaning Diapers
We use a dry pail for our dirty diapers. It is a trash can (that I decorated) with a PUL liner (planet wise purchase on Amazon with swagbucks… whoop!) that we pull out and transfer to the washing machine. Everything gets washed and we never touch a dirty diaper after it comes off the baby. I occasionally wash out my pail because I’m paranoid about our bathroom smelling… a little bleach or oxiclean does the trick.
Before a poopy diaper goes into the pail the poop has to be rinsed out. We have a little luxury item in this department… our diaper sprayer. You can purchase one, but I read a blog about how to assemble one from parts at your Home Depot… I spent about $20 and I don’t have to splash around in poopy water to get the diaper clean (unless I’m at Grandma’s house… then I just suck it up and wash my hands afterwards).
To wash the diapers (in the washing machine) I do a pre-rinse, hot wash and two rinses. We started using Charlie’s Soap, but have since switched to any soap without brighteners, fragrances or softeners… I’m a little liberal when it comes to detergents. I try to avoid brighteners, fragrances or softeners because they can build up on your diapers and make them less absorbent… but I have used whatever is available at Grandma’s house and we lived through it. I made a decision that life is too short to worry about detergents and moved on. If my diapers get ruined then I will just make more or fix them. Even if I have to purchase a new set of cloth diapers with each kid I’m still saving some money so I’m really not going to worry about it.
I line dry anything that has PUL on it and usually everything else goes in the drier. Because I got a really high electricity bill last month (I think it was because of all the additional laundry not just diapers… extra bath towels, burp cloths, baby clothes, bibs, blankets he spit up on, etc) I decided to start line drying more things. I did try at first to line dry my prefolds, but I really did not like the crunchy prefold (and I didn’t want to “fluff” it after it dried… too much work to pull everything out, let it dry, put everything back in and then sort it again). However, that electricity bill was high! So for the month of September I’m turning off lights more and air drying all of our laundry to see if it makes a difference. If it doesn’t affect our bill much, then I’m totally going back to using our drier.
Now wool covers are a different animal (literally… haha). Initially I thought this was going to be way too much work, but it’s not bad at all. You can’t throw your wool covers in the washing machine like you can your other covers because they will felt (making them smaller) and they won’t stay lanolized if you do that. You have to hand wash them and re-lanolize them about every 2-3 weeks or when the lanolin wears off. It’s not hard to lanolize at all… and it doesn’t take much time.
“On-the-go” cloth diapers
When we go out for day trips (to church, bible study or to visit a friend) I pack a few extra cloth diapers, a wet bag and my cloth wipes.
The cloth diapers are much much bulker than disposables and I don’t know how to fix that… but it is really nice to not worry about buying disposables. The wet bags are used for putting wet diapers in (or a swim suit if you are at the pool). The wipes are dry and the spray bottle (recycled from old body mist container) has the wipe solution in it. I hardly use wipes when I’m out but when I do it’s the same routine… I put the wipes in the diaper and the diaper in the wet bag. When I get home I empty the contents of the wet bag into the diaper pail and throw the wet bag in behind it… I don’t touch a thing! So far my bags have not leaked. I have two Kushies bags that I used my swagbucks to get… didn’t cost me a penny! However, I need more. We get pretty busy over the weekend and I could use another 3 wet bags… so I’m saving more swagbucks.
When we go for an overnight trip I pack everything (EVERYTHING) into a separate suitcase. I’m sure with more experience I will be able to just add the supplies to our suitcase, but I’m always afraid I’m going to need something so I just bring it all. What I’ve done in the past is do the last load of diaper laundry a couple of hours before we leave. When the laundry is done I put all the clean diapers in the suit case and grab the baby and the diaper bag for the trip there. Doing laundry overnight works well because all the PUL can line dry and the baby only dirties one diaper during that time. Then when we are ready to head back home I do the same thing at whoever’s house we are staying at. I use my Bumgenius diapers when John is going to be in the car seat for long periods of time because sitting on wet diaper is hard for his bum and they have the special stay dry liner. I’ve had no problems so far and will probably keep using cloth when we do overnight trips.
ALRIGHTY! You lived through the most detail explanation of anyone’s diapering system you will ever get. But just in case you are still reading, I’ve got more for ya!
I’ve mentioned diaper rash a few times. It has been our biggest problem so far but he is getting it less often now. When John got diaper rash in the past it would clear up if I used a rash ointment. However, you have to use a disposable diaper when using most ointments (ointments approved for cloth diapers get expensive… and we all know how I hate to spend money). Rash ointments are designed to repel water and if they get on cloth diapers and it is very, very hard to wash out. The result is a cloth diaper that doesn’t absorb water… bad cloth diaper!
This problem began when John started sleeping more than 3-4 hours at a time. When he was a newborn I changed his diaper at every feeding so his bum stayed dry. When he started sleeping longer at night I began to notice red bumps. I switched to disposables long enough to clear up the rash and then used my Flip and Bumgenius diapers at night. These two brands have a “stay dry” liner and it helps a lot.
Another thing that helped a lot with diaper rash was “naked man” time. After a bath we let John play on the floor naked for a while, usually in the kitchen on a towel (or a prefold) so that it is easy to clean up when he pees (in the future we will just let him run around naked outside… don’t worry, we have a privacy fence). You kinda have to be proactive, but “naked man” time works so well that if I catch the rash early enough I can give him a bath and let him “air out” and the rash will be gone the next day. It makes me very happy!... because I don’t have to spend money on either diaper rash ointment or disposable diapers.
My homemade diapers came about because I wanted to mimic the “stay dry” liners found in the Bumgenius and Flip diaper (and because I wanted to save mad amounts of money). The stay dry liner that Cotton Babies has on some of their products is really like a fancy fleece/suede material. Fleece will dry out quickly… have you ever taken a fleece jacket out of the wash… it’s pretty dry even before being dried in the drier. So fleece is a great material for a diaper that is against a baby’s bottom for long periods of time… and I wanted it on ALL my diapers!
I started looking around my house for fleece. I cut up an old scarf and made long rectangle liners that I put on top of his prefolds so that it would protect his bottom from the wet diaper. It wasn’t a bad idea… I just had to do extra sorting once the diapers came out of the wash. I decided I need to attach the fleece to my diapers so that I wouldn’t have to sort out liners from diapers. But I didn’t want to sew it on to my prefolds because they worked great as burp cloths, “naked man” pee protectors, and as inserts for our pocket diapers.
Around the same time I decided I wanted to increase my supply of diapers. I had previously been using the diapers that we received as gifts and I had to do laundry every other day and it was a pain. I know that prefolds are as inexpensive as you can get, but I had heard of making prefolds from old t-shirts and I thought I might experiment with adding my fleece to them. I made 3 prefolds with fleece… they worked great, but I wanted to see how hard it was to make a fitted diaper. Turns out it wasn’t that much harder… and I loved using my fitted diaper (and now have 16). So I went back and made my 3 t-shirt prefolds into fitted diapers.
All this time there was only a small fleece rectangle on the inside of my diaper. During a visit to my mother’s house she let me have a good amount of extra white fleece that she wasn’t using. I used my template to cut out full coverage fleece to go next to John’s sensitive skin. I then proceeded to take apart ALL of my homemade diapers (which was up to 12 by this time) and re-line them. It was a lot of work, and I kept shaking my head at myself while I was doing it, but it was really worth it. Now my diapers look a lot more professional and fleece (aka stay dryness) is the only thing touching John’s skin. I’m very pleased.
John pretty much wears the homemade fitteds if he isn’t wearing a Bumgenius or a Flip. I do still use prefolds, but only when we are running low and I need to do laundry. It’s kinda nice because when I run out of fitted diapers I put John in a prefold and do a load of laundry… prefolds are like my signal to start the washing machine.
Okay, believe it or not, I can’t think of anything else to add! If you have any questions about cloth diapering just ask! I love talking about cloth diapers (as you can see)! :) :) :)
Right at John's 3 month birthday he started to roll from his tummy to his back. Then, the day he turned 4 months old he rolled over from his back to his tummy! Now I'm kinda curious what he will be doing for this 5 month birthday (we will be in an airport most of that day... eek!). Maybe he will sit unsupported... or crawl... or walk, hahaha!
I know he won't walk and it is very unlikely that he will crawl, but he has gotten a lot more mobile. He hardly stays in the same place that we put him down when we put him down to play. And keeping a blanket under him is close to impossible now. In the morning when I go get him out of bed, if he's not playing, he is in some of the most interesting positions. And during naps now he almost always prefers to lay on his side. In the begining I thought he was a tummy sleeper (but Steven didn't like it when I put him down like that because of SIDS) and I think he is very fond of the new found freedom to get in whatever position he wants to be in to sleep.
Below is a pretty long video of John rolling over... but if you want to skip to the actually rolling over go to 5 minutes and 30 seconds. I was going to trim it down to like 2 minutes, but he was being so cute as he was trying to talk to me. I've been meaning to get a video of him talking, but he hasn't preformed on camera until now... so I couldn't edit it out.
Also, he smiles really really big for me at 2 minutes & 30 seconds. He has the best smile and he gave me a good one. I'm so happy I got it on camera... now I can look back on it later.
I was in bed trying to fall asleep and a thought occurred to me, "I haven't posted videos of John on my blog in a while!" So now I'm catching up! Enjoy!
This one is kinda funny. Steven was on his way to come meet me at a friends house. He had to pack up the baby and he decided to take a video of John's "Car Seat Handles." I'm not sure if all kids hold onto their car seat like this, but John does it a lot. We get a kick out of it because he looks like he is bracing for a crazy roller coaster ride. Anyway, Steven took a video and John kinda makes a car noise (really it's a "I'm tired, please put me to bed noise"... he actually fell asleep in the car on the way).
The next one is of John waking up from a nap. He does this crazy tongue/air sucking thing. It's like he has a pacifier in his mouth... but he doesn't. Just a cute little thing I decided to put on camera for him later... he will have a lot videos to watch later!
Then their is the Bumbo! This one is a little longer... and really a video of nothing, but we are first time parents so we will find any excuse to get out our cameras.
And finally, vertical blinds! This was taken about a month ago (maybe a little longer) and it's of John playing with his vertical blinds. I say "his" because I hate them. I was considering taking them down (and still may do so) but have delayed it because it entertains him so well. The morning I took this video he played with them for like 1.5 hours! Which is like a marathon for a baby.
That's all I've got for tonight... but coming soon (to a computer screen near you) is a video of John rolling over! I know, exciting, isn't it!?! I was pretty excited when I got it on video... now to get it edited and put up in a decent amount of time...
Isn't this outfit cute!?!
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