nappies..cloth v disposable

[BabyHMummy]

Ok folks so this has prob been done to death but am a relative newbie at this baby lark.

All my friends have used disposable and have been you guys discussing the pros and cons of the various types of cloth nappies and am trying to work out which i am going to use.

Have done some research so i know the green debate is pretty much a mute point as work out about same risk to the environment and cost lose electricity being an ever increasing cost means that by and large they cancel each other out. So which do i pick.

Please help by telling me What choice have you made and why?

Also, there is no way there isn't a green arguement for cloth. The manufacturing process for disposables is shocking in terms of water usage/wastage, and the piles of plastic wrapped poo being buried for our children's children's children to dig up, still whole, is just rank! Me buying second hand cloth with no air miles, and doing a couple of extra washes a week does bot compare imo.

Thanks purple

Its interesting reading how many of u use cloth. I ambstill quite concerned by the faff of them which doesn't appear to be allayed by any of the posts i am afraid.

I get that coat of materials the cloth work.out cheaper esp if having more than oone baby (i won't be) but the initial outlay seems huge and frankly i just cannot justify it at the moment so i think for me it may be disposables as i can buy them weekly and spread the cost

Although the Eco arguement got me to use cloth for my dd's, it is the faff that will make me use them again if/when we have dc3.
I found it really difficult to leave the house at times when dd's were little and it would have added an awful lot of stress if I also had to worry about running out if nappies. It was definately less hassle to use cloth.
I think this time, I will go for terries though as they are so much cheaper and easier to dry although they aren't so pretty.

Re cost - cloth doesn't need to be expensive upfront. DS is 2 and we have spent a grand total of about £20 on cloth nappies in that time.

There are loads of nappies available second hand for next to nothing, or nothing. We got some from a friend, some from Freecycle, some from eBay, some brand new but at no cost to us with £50 voucher from the Council, and some from the regular free swaps our local "Real Nappy" (not my favourite term!) group hold.

(We use disposables over night, always have for ease of use, but it means a pack of Lidl disposables lasts weeks and weeks).

Sounds like you've decided already, BabyH, I don't understand the point of the thread

purple my point was i don't know anyone in rl who has used cloth and was interested to find out if the faff i read about was just brands making it sound more difficult or if it genuinely was a faff...all this talk of pads and liners and stuffing them, relanoling them...am allergic to lanolin so not a great option for me...just seems to me like what impression i had was fairly accurate.

Lanolin is only if you use wool pants over nappies babyH, you don't have to use them at all.

Honestly I am one of the laziest cows going re housework and it really is honestly just a matter of say ten minutes every two days to sort them out.
Putting a liner on a nappy is no more a faff than sticking a bodyform in your knickers, less so cause you don't have to unwrap and stick it in ;) Changing cloth nappies takes no longer than changing a dispo. Putting a cloth nappy into a bucket takes no longer than putting a dispo in the bin outside.

Have a look at The Nappy Lady website. Your posts suggested you knew more than you actually do

All nappies consist of an absorbent bit and a water proof bit, whether washable or chuckable.

All In One - AIO - is like a disposable that you can wash. You have a waterproof (Polyurethane Laminate, either cotton or nylon) outer shell, an absorbent middle (cotton or bamboo terry, microfibre like cleaning cloths or hemp jersey) then a fleece bit that goes next to the baby's skin to wick away moisture. The absorbent middle usually flips out so they dry faster, 3-4 hours on my radiators. They fasten with velcro (or aplix, which is a softer version) or poppers. Less faff than getting to the shops when you've run out, or baby's grumpy/cluster feeding/it's pissing with rain.

The there are Pockets. These are the cheapie ones that you see on ebay in cool prints. You get a waterproof outer and a fleece inner like the AIOs but have to stuff them yourself. Takes me 10 minutes to do all mine or an extra 30 seconds if I've been lazy and haven't prepped, and they offer greater flexibility because the different materials have different absorption rates. Slightly faffy but still easier than getting to the shops.

Two parters are also called fitteds. You get a nappy-shaped bit made of several layers of terry - like a ready folded traditional flat nappy - which you put a waterproof layer over. This can be made of PUL, fleece or wool (which needs lanolising). Fairly faffy, but with the right nappy plus extra layers you can get 10+ hours overnight.

Flat nappies are traditional ones, either the terries which are like a towel or prefolds which are smooth and part-folded then stitched. Mucho faffola but very very cheap. You need a wrap like the two parters for these. You'll also need pins or nappy nippas for these.

Google "nappy library + " and it's likely that you'll find lots of real life people nearby using cloth :)

Oh, and do not use water in your nappy bin it makes poo soup! Get a big mesh laundry bag and a cheap lidded bin (mine was £4 in Wilkinson) and stick a sanitary towel with a couple of drops of essential oil on to the lid :o 1 tbsp powder plus an extra rinse at the end of a 40* cycle in the machine and go

I came across this company recently. I think that recycling disposable nappies rather than sending them to land-fill sounds great - but I do wonder about the green implications of driving around collecting used nappies.

www.youtube.com/watch?annotation_id=annotation_218562&feature=iv&src_vid=wKtrbXO-lik&v=wKtrbXO-lik#t=4m44s

This lady explains the whole thing very well. (US but still applies)

We used cloth nappies (bumgenius) with DS and they were absolutely brilliant. Spent about £250, but I worked out that was paid off by the time he was about 30 weeks or so.

Yes, it does require a bit of effort to wash them every few days, but I found that it turned what could have been something negative (bin full of old nappies) into something positive (lovely clean nappies on the drying rack). Use liners, wear some gloves to put them in the washer and you are absolutely fine.

Environmental impact: there was a widely discredited Department for the Environment study that said they were of equal impact to disposables, however the study assumed behaviours such as ironing the nappies and washing at high temperatures. A second study found that washables were lower impact than disposables, as long as they were washed/dried using low-impact methods. I think, from memory, that if they are always washed at 60 and always tumble dried they use up more energy, whereas if you wash mostly at 40 and air-dry then they are fine. However, this study had also not taken into account the positive impact of the nappies being used for a second child or passed on to another family.

I still have half my stash of nappies (hoping for another baby) and gave the other half away so that they can be tried out by some lovely new baby bottoms! We have used some disposables along the way (night time after about 1 year and days out), but most of the time he has been in cloth and I am really happy that we went down that road.

We love our cloth! DS wears totsbots easyfits during the day and a mush mash of two parters (that I've picked up from nearly new sales) overnight.
I honestly don't find it a faff to shove a load of nappies in the washing machine every couple of days. They're dry the next day even in this weather.
Second checking out The Nappy Lady website - we bought from her and she's fab! Happy to help with queries and if you're local she can do demos too.
There are lots of fb groups too - if fb is your thing.

Oh yes, all the financial studies are based on brand new nappies - at £15 each in Tesco (Totsbots Easyfits) that's a lot of wasted money! I bought 5 brand new nappies - a half price easyfit when Tesco reduced them (£7.50) and 4 half price realeasies (£6 each from www.babykind.co.uk) the other 100 or so nappies and wraps were cheap, and average less than £2 per nappy - most would be £8-10 new.

www.twinkleontheweb.co.uk is good too, there's a leaflet you can download with everything you need to know on.

I have used second hand mother ease for 7 months found through pre loved for £ 55. Prefer them to disposables for following reasons : less leakage, cheaper and better for environment if washed and dried responsibly , didn't like the chemical smell of disposables . Don't find them much more work or a faff at all. I felt guilty every time I put a disposable in the bin. but that's just me.

Cheers Foof will have a look...been chatting to dp and is ex sil used them and he hates them apparently so may have my work cut out of i decide to try. I may try and get come.second hand ones to tryanandsee how i get on with them once bean arrives and then make a final decision

We used quick drying nappies (Close Parent Dream Dri) which dried overnight so we didn't have to tumble dry them. I haven't calculated how much we avoided sending to landfill in the time we used them but it would have been a significant volume - and remember that even eco nappies don't decompose in landfill because of the lack of oxygen.

Of course it doesn't have to be one or the other. We used washables during the day and disposables at night and when washables weren't convenient (for example, on long days out). That meant we bought fewer washables.

I'm not really bothered which people use, each to their own in this case. What does bother me is when people defend their choices with untrue anti cloth stories. They aren't unhygienic. And they ARE more environmentally friendly. You say one of the studies was from boots! Think about their priorities. They sell tonnes of disposable nappies, not only their own brand but nearly every other brand you can get. And wipes! And nappy bins/sacks and nappy cream! (Which you are less likely to need from cloth).

One of the biggest benefits for me is minimising toxins. (The crystals in disposables do worry me a bit, but mostly those from baby wipes.)

My favourite thing about cloth is that they look cuter than paper ones. I get just as much enjoyment picking nappies as I do picking clothes.

The next best thing is their flexibility. You can get really really cheap nappies made of terry cotton/bamboo, or flat nappies/prefolds that need a waterproof wrap that are very leak proof but fairly bulky, or you can be a bit more extravagant and get fancy Velcro/popper all in ones/pockets that are as slim as a disposable and come in various colours/patterns/minky outers. It's good to have a mix. Unfortunately lots of people try one type and rather than explore assume all wont suit them.

Washing nappies (lift net bag from bucket, throw in machine then dryer) really isn't more hassle than buying. (Lift nappies and wipes from supermarket shelf, pay, put in boot, put away). Newborn poo can go straight in wash and toddler poo tips straight into bog.

I don't think you have to stick to one or the other either. Why not try both?

Re the expense, they are available easily secondhand for a fraction of the retail price. Not only is this more environmentally friendly, but you could spread the cost and buy one a week during pregnancy and save even more money. Try cloth nappy tree . com.

If your not bothered about buying from abroad, you can get very cheap ones from eBay, alba baby brand are good.

Thanks Dave...will maybe get a few second hand ones and give them a try and see how i get on with them

ironing nappies!? Where did they get the idea people iron nappies?

I've got some second hand ones from Ebay, the beauty of them being that they will be lovely and absorbant already, if you get brand new ones, just like with towels they need washing a few times before use to get them to full absorbancy.

I bought 8 Little lamb ones with 4 i think it was wraps to go over, for about £7 inc postage! You can get some really good bargains on Ebay

I used bumbles for my ds (fleece lined, about £3 each) with motherease wraps. They were great at first, but from 4 weeks he was always saturated. I used to check him every half hour in the end. Never had a problem with them leaking, but his skin got so raw it was awful.
We went away on holiday when he was 13 weeks old, so I took disposables. I sold the nappies on ebay when we got home as his legs cleared up within a couple of days.
Shame, as the looked so bloody cute drying on the line (like little chickens!)