Reusables with/without liners and washing

[ScathingContempt]

I'm just starting out with cloth nappies and looking for a bit of advice on some things.

I'm using BTP pockets and am not sure what to do about liners. I've bought some flushable ones, though I don't actually flush them in case they block our system. However, I'm wondering if I should ditch them or use fleece. The nappies have a very soft lining anyway which I think is fleece (they're cheapies, alvas). But if I don't use liners, or if I use fleece, how do I deal with the poo until they're washed? I don't know if I can just dry pail all the poo until wash day, then give them a rinse cycle before washing? Won't it stain or go manky in the bucket?

I don't want to rinse each nappy/liner as I take it off as we're on a water meter and we try to conserve water usage where possible. It's too sloppy to scrape off (baby is 5 weeks old and BF).

Today I used a flushable liner but the poo went over the sides of it onto the nappy. I did rinse the nappy before putting it in the bucket but don't want to be doing this regularly.

So I think what I'm asking is, is it fine to chuck really pooey nappies and fleece liners into the bucket and just leave them until I wash, which will be every 2-3 days, if I do a short rinse cycle before the main wash?

We use flushable bambinex liners. If the poo has gone on the nappy, I try and either wipe it off with a washable wipe or loo roll (if only a little bit) or rinse the nappy under the toilet flush (if lots of poo). Not tried fleece liners, but would probably dunk them in the toilet bowl to get rid of the poo. I wouldn't want to put really really dirty nappies straight into the washing machine.

Dried-on poo stains.

Are you dry-bucketing or wet-bucketing?

How often are you washing the nappies?

I'm dry pailing & washing every 2 or 3 days.

I can't really dunk fleece liners in the toilet because we only flush after a couple of wees, or after poos because of the water meter. Didn't want to rinse each one out, again for the water meter.

The meter drives me mad, it was in the house when we bought it so no choice to remove it and as a house of 5 plus a baby we have to do what we can help to keep usage down.

I'm really keen to try fleece liners but if they need cleaning with water as they come off I might have to stick to disposables.

Have you actually looked at how much you pay for water? It is generally pretty cheap - a few quid for 1000 litres - surely a bit of water to rinse the liner in would be cheaper than a disposable?

I just leave pre-solids BF baby poo on, I must confess, because it's pretty much just liquid. It almost all soaks into the nappy anyway or forms a thin solid crust if I've been a slattern and not changed the nappy quickly enough. Disposable liners are pointless, I find, and slightly defeat the waste-saving point of cloth. I used them for a while with DS1, but as he got more mobile, they just rucked up into his bum crack and he developed the genius ability to avoid the liner completely when pooing.

I don't bother with any rinsing at all with DS2's BF poo nappies - it just goes straight from bum to (dry) bucket, then into the washing machine every couple of days, at which point I give the bucket a good wipe out with disinfectant and I never have any problems with smell.

With post-weaning poos, I'd take the nappy straight into the toilet, shake and scrape off as much as I could into the toilet using toilet paper, then put the nappy in the nappy bucket, then do a pre-rinse on that load in the washer. I did this right up until DS1 was potty trained last month (2yrs 7mo).

If you really must rinse, my cloth nappy guru recommends buying a bidet hose from B&Q, if you have exposed plumbing coming from your toilet cistern. You can attach the hose there, then spray poo off directly into the toilet. I can see why you might want to do this with solids nappies but I really can't see the point with EBF nappies.

Don't do wet-pailing. Quite apart from poo soup (ew!) it's bad for the fibres of the nappy to be soaking in a mix containing acidic poo, and will affect absorbency.

I agree with Elphaba, with bf baby poo I used a disposable liner but it was fairly useless and nappies just went in the wash with poo on and were in the pail for a day or two. Poo after weaning is different!

Pre solids everything just went in bucket and then washed every day/ second day. Post solids I use fleece liners or no liner. Poo just shaken (or scraped a bit with toilet paper) into loo and then nappy in bucket.

We do a cold rinse, wash at 60 (or 40 plus mio fresh) with 1/2 detergent and then an extra rinse afterwards.

I didn't bother with liners at that point, just dry nappy bucket (with a sealed lid!) and washed every day. If you do a cold rinse before washing and don't leave the poo too long it all comes off. Any stains disappear like magic if left in the sunshine outside as the UV breaks down the bilirubin.

I've read that EBF baby poo is water soluble. It washes off just fine, anyway, IME. Liners were useless during that period, except as stay-dry material (but since you have Alva pockets, you'll have that already built in).

Once they're weaning/weaned, you've gotta put it down the toilet. Because bits of undigested food will hang around in your washing machine otherwise (I know, gross...).