Monday, March 7, 2011

Cloth Diaper Report #2

We are now on the final snaps of Violet’s small cloth diapers. They are as large as they can get. We were lucky enough to have gotten the set of 24 diapers from some close friends of ours, and we went along assuming that they would have a medium set for us when the time was right. It was not to be – their medium set is in use by another family member, so we’re on our own. They did give us their set of large cloth diapers, and we have another set that was given to us by one of my classroom parents last year (it’s crazy how generous people have been…). We tried to put one of the large diapers on Violet, hoping that maybe we could get by using them on the smallest sizing, but she would’ve looked like she was wearing a puffy, sleeveless bathing suit. You might be wondering why we don’t just order a set of our own, and we’d thought about it some time ago, fearing that this might happen. The truth is that reusable diapers are an upfront investment. A set of 24 FuzziBunz (the brand we use) cost between $350-$400 (about $15 each). They’re worth it in the long run, especially considering how much a pack of disposables cost, but for us, that amount of money hurts. So, yesterday, I spent some time looking online for a deal. Believe it or not, there’s a website – diaperswappers – that is a forum for people trading, selling, and buying cloth diapers. We looked at a few lots for sale, but most had something wrong with them that turned us off – loose elastic, staining, etc. Finally, we ended up on eBay and found a brand of diapers called Papoose. The price seemed too good to be true – 24 diapers for $86 (about $3.50 each). I checked around on other sites and couldn’t find a single negative review of the brand, but I did find many positive ones. A woman even posted a video on YouTube comparing Papoose to two other brands and proclaimed Papoose the best. The sketchy part? They’re from China, which leaves me wondering if they’re crafted from recycled circuit boards and coated in lead and the shipping time was listed ominously as “varies”, but again, I couldn’t find any bad reviews, so we ordered them. As if to confirm my fears, I received this amusingly worded follow up email from the sender today:
i am sorry to bother you, friend, thanks for you buying, would you please tell me which color are in need? or would you mind we sending them by random color? look forward to your reply. thanks.
I’ll let you know how they work out, if and when they arrive…


107 days old

6 comments:

  1. You might stick it out with the big ones until she grows into them. Our cloth service has only small and large, so for a while, the large were REALLY large. And of course we had to put slightly bigger pants on Macie, but they were too long, so things were a bit silly for a while. But they grow fast. And of course, the large hold things in a bit better. :)

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  2. Also, we use regular old cloth diapers with prorap covers. If you were to buy those, they would be MUCH cheaper! Holy crow, I did not realize how expensive those fuzzibunz things are.

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  3. Amy - We probably should've actually tried the large ones on Violet before ordering the mediums, but the deal on the Papoose diapers had us excited. It is funny how big the diapers are on them at first - when she was a newborn, Violet was swimming in the small ones!

    What are prorap covers?

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  4. It's a velcro-close diaper cover. Here's a link:
    http://www.cottonbabies.com/product_info.php?products_id=284

    Basically, you just take a traditional pre-fold diaper (the kind with the thicker middle) and layer it in the prorap, then put it under the baby and wrap it up. It takes a little practice to do it securely, but it's not hard. It's how our service works -- you either rent or buy the covers, and they take care of the diapers. But you could certainly buy your own diapers.

    This is the service we use; it's not perfect, but with both of us working, it's a good solution for us. We hardly use any disposables, and we don't have to wash diapers.
    http://www.dydeebaby.com/

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  6. You have given me another reason why I wish Penn were potty trained! I'd be happy to donate if I could. :)

    (just had to correct some spelling in my initial post...)

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